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A recognition of the best children’s books, to build a new ‘grammar of fantasy’

“I never stopped reading, reading, reading; every book I read represented a facet of the infinite, which I chased and chased, and always failed to catch.” Words by Pietro Citati that aptly describe his extraordinary literary passion and outstanding critical sharpness, both featured in La ragazza dagli occhi d’oro (The girl with the golden eyes), published by Adelphi, whose title pays homage to Honoré de Balzac. It’s a book about books, a journey through words and memories, an endless path towards the infinite he embarked on with his friend Italo Calvino. Words, too, that are more essential than ever in making us realise the importance of kindling a passion for reading in children, and from the very start of their education.

Reading as the pleasure of discovery and adventure, a way to experience many other lives besides ours, a means to imagine uncharted worlds, to learn, to understand, to create – to build a genuine Grammar of fantasy, as suggested Gianni Rodari, a master of children’s literature, blending “textual pleasure” with a passion for learning, journeying both within and beyond history.

These are fertile times for good books aimed at children and young adults, with promising publishing opportunities, and new authors discovered and launched side by side with the great “classics”. This can be seen on social media, especially those most popular with the younger generations, as the growing number of “BookTokers” on TikTok demonstrates, but also in the efforts undertaken by the most prestigious literary publications – La Lettura, the Sunday cultural supplement by Corriere della Sera, has recently launched a new edition dubbed La Letturina, devoted “to children and young adults, but also to parents, teachers, educators and all those in touch with their inner child”, full of real-life stories, contributions by great authors, reading tips and suggestions for films and games inspired by books. And there’s also Robinson, the cultural supplement by la Repubblica, quick to jump on the trend with its issue entitled “Merry Christmas kids”, featuring stories by the star authors of fantasy and young adult narrative genres. It’s a whole world to be unravelled, understood, nourished.

Further evidence of this increased interest in young readers is also noticeable in the higher number and quality of the books nominated for the second edition of the Campiello Junior literary prize, promoted by the Campiello Foundation and by the Pirelli Foundation, which comprises two categories: children aged seven to ten and young adults aged eleven to fourteen years.

Only last week, in fact, the technical panel – chaired by Roberto Piumini, a prominent children’s book author, and including Chiara Lagani, Martino Negri, Michela Possamai and David Tolin – selected the three finalists in each category, and has now entrusted them to the popular jury (240 young readers), which will choose the winner next May (all information can be found at www.premiocampiello.org and www.fondazionepirelli.org). A difficult choice, assert the technical jurors, given the authors’ high level. And an auspicious sign that authors will continue to focus on an audience that’s gradually becoming more discerning, attentive and sophisticated – as reading enhances children’s intellectual development.

In fact, Roberto Piumini, talking about the choice to split the Award into two age groups, comments that, “Children and young adults experience reading differently; the former feel more of an emotional and playful connection, the latter a more complex, and at times even emotionally intense, one.” In other words, this is literature in tune with individual and generational needs. Another novelty introduced this year is the inclusion of a volume of poetry in each category: “The aim is twofold: on the one hand, this is a way to formally introduce children to poetry as, though read and studied especially in primary school, remains nonetheless scarce in bookshops. On the other hand, this might also inspire and encourage the publishing industry.” Indeed, the Campiello Junior literary prize could “continue to widen its perspective” and evolve into a “Prize for creative writing, an integral part of the network – or fabric – encompassing writing, publishing, reading and a social practice that, after careful consideration, could prove to be a cure for our times, marked by a great clatter but too few words.”

Here’s the crux of the matter: our times are indeed marked by a great clatter and too few words, by an overabundance of demagoguery and fumbling chattering loaded with resentment (and, worryingly, social media are the main vehicle for this). Hence, we need to insist on the quality of the written – and read – word, which could turn into a good antidote to the corruption of language, speech and relationships, starting from the first stages of education.

In fact, reading provides an extraordinary impetus to the creation of a future-oriented story and also fosters a fundamental human state – happiness. We should be reading not as a chore but, above all, as an exercise for the imagination, as the joyful pursuit of a vivid relationship with the world of ideas and emotions, as a continuous act of discovery, aware that the children we now entice into the world of literature are not just the readers of today, but also the citizens of tomorrow.

La cultura è come il pane” (Culture is like bread), read the cover of the Rivista Pirelli magazine in January 1951, referring to an article by Silvestro Severgnini expounding on how cultural activities (conferences, concerts, the sponsorship of exhibitions and art exhibits, corporate libraries) played a key role in the process of economic, social and civic reconstruction and the recovery of Italy, which – once the dreadful debris of fascism, racial laws and war had been cleared out – picked up momentum and set the scene for the economic boom.

Indeed, the basic notion of a link between industry and culture was also a familiar one in enterprises such as Olivetti, Eni, and Iri’s Finmeccanica, the latter of which published an excellent magazine befittingly titled Civiltà delle macchine (Civilised machinery), to suggest a bustling, transformative industrial and social civilisation. A concept that’s still very relevant today, when talking about “industrial humanism” – now evolving into “digital humanism” – and its need for a vigorous and widespread “polytechnic culture” able to blend humanities and scientific knowledge.

We live in an era marked by the “knowledge economy”, where not only corporate competitiveness – and thus employment, well-being and sustainable development – but also the foundations of civil coexistence, are at play. As such, we really do need to insist on the development of a widespread culture in order to attain awareness, critical skills, and imagination, the qualities required to conceive and paint a better future – in this perspective, children’s books come to represent the cornerstones of civilisation.

“I never stopped reading, reading, reading; every book I read represented a facet of the infinite, which I chased and chased, and always failed to catch.” Words by Pietro Citati that aptly describe his extraordinary literary passion and outstanding critical sharpness, both featured in La ragazza dagli occhi d’oro (The girl with the golden eyes), published by Adelphi, whose title pays homage to Honoré de Balzac. It’s a book about books, a journey through words and memories, an endless path towards the infinite he embarked on with his friend Italo Calvino. Words, too, that are more essential than ever in making us realise the importance of kindling a passion for reading in children, and from the very start of their education.

Reading as the pleasure of discovery and adventure, a way to experience many other lives besides ours, a means to imagine uncharted worlds, to learn, to understand, to create – to build a genuine Grammar of fantasy, as suggested Gianni Rodari, a master of children’s literature, blending “textual pleasure” with a passion for learning, journeying both within and beyond history.

These are fertile times for good books aimed at children and young adults, with promising publishing opportunities, and new authors discovered and launched side by side with the great “classics”. This can be seen on social media, especially those most popular with the younger generations, as the growing number of “BookTokers” on TikTok demonstrates, but also in the efforts undertaken by the most prestigious literary publications – La Lettura, the Sunday cultural supplement by Corriere della Sera, has recently launched a new edition dubbed La Letturina, devoted “to children and young adults, but also to parents, teachers, educators and all those in touch with their inner child”, full of real-life stories, contributions by great authors, reading tips and suggestions for films and games inspired by books. And there’s also Robinson, the cultural supplement by la Repubblica, quick to jump on the trend with its issue entitled “Merry Christmas kids”, featuring stories by the star authors of fantasy and young adult narrative genres. It’s a whole world to be unravelled, understood, nourished.

Further evidence of this increased interest in young readers is also noticeable in the higher number and quality of the books nominated for the second edition of the Campiello Junior literary prize, promoted by the Campiello Foundation and by the Pirelli Foundation, which comprises two categories: children aged seven to ten and young adults aged eleven to fourteen years.

Only last week, in fact, the technical panel – chaired by Roberto Piumini, a prominent children’s book author, and including Chiara Lagani, Martino Negri, Michela Possamai and David Tolin – selected the three finalists in each category, and has now entrusted them to the popular jury (240 young readers), which will choose the winner next May (all information can be found at www.premiocampiello.org and www.fondazionepirelli.org). A difficult choice, assert the technical jurors, given the authors’ high level. And an auspicious sign that authors will continue to focus on an audience that’s gradually becoming more discerning, attentive and sophisticated – as reading enhances children’s intellectual development.

In fact, Roberto Piumini, talking about the choice to split the Award into two age groups, comments that, “Children and young adults experience reading differently; the former feel more of an emotional and playful connection, the latter a more complex, and at times even emotionally intense, one.” In other words, this is literature in tune with individual and generational needs. Another novelty introduced this year is the inclusion of a volume of poetry in each category: “The aim is twofold: on the one hand, this is a way to formally introduce children to poetry as, though read and studied especially in primary school, remains nonetheless scarce in bookshops. On the other hand, this might also inspire and encourage the publishing industry.” Indeed, the Campiello Junior literary prize could “continue to widen its perspective” and evolve into a “Prize for creative writing, an integral part of the network – or fabric – encompassing writing, publishing, reading and a social practice that, after careful consideration, could prove to be a cure for our times, marked by a great clatter but too few words.”

Here’s the crux of the matter: our times are indeed marked by a great clatter and too few words, by an overabundance of demagoguery and fumbling chattering loaded with resentment (and, worryingly, social media are the main vehicle for this). Hence, we need to insist on the quality of the written – and read – word, which could turn into a good antidote to the corruption of language, speech and relationships, starting from the first stages of education.

In fact, reading provides an extraordinary impetus to the creation of a future-oriented story and also fosters a fundamental human state – happiness. We should be reading not as a chore but, above all, as an exercise for the imagination, as the joyful pursuit of a vivid relationship with the world of ideas and emotions, as a continuous act of discovery, aware that the children we now entice into the world of literature are not just the readers of today, but also the citizens of tomorrow.

La cultura è come il pane” (Culture is like bread), read the cover of the Rivista Pirelli magazine in January 1951, referring to an article by Silvestro Severgnini expounding on how cultural activities (conferences, concerts, the sponsorship of exhibitions and art exhibits, corporate libraries) played a key role in the process of economic, social and civic reconstruction and the recovery of Italy, which – once the dreadful debris of fascism, racial laws and war had been cleared out – picked up momentum and set the scene for the economic boom.

Indeed, the basic notion of a link between industry and culture was also a familiar one in enterprises such as Olivetti, Eni, and Iri’s Finmeccanica, the latter of which published an excellent magazine befittingly titled Civiltà delle macchine (Civilised machinery), to suggest a bustling, transformative industrial and social civilisation. A concept that’s still very relevant today, when talking about “industrial humanism” – now evolving into “digital humanism” – and its need for a vigorous and widespread “polytechnic culture” able to blend humanities and scientific knowledge.

We live in an era marked by the “knowledge economy”, where not only corporate competitiveness – and thus employment, well-being and sustainable development – but also the foundations of civil coexistence, are at play. As such, we really do need to insist on the development of a widespread culture in order to attain awareness, critical skills, and imagination, the qualities required to conceive and paint a better future – in this perspective, children’s books come to represent the cornerstones of civilisation.