Industrial Humanism

Edited by the Pirelli Foundation, and published by Mondadori in June 2019, Industrial Humanism: An Anthology of Thoughts, Words, Images and Innovations is a publishing project that documents the extraordinary experience of Pirelli magazine, published from 1948 to 1972.

It offers an in-depth, carefully researched analysis of the cultural significance of the magazine, which is retraced through its thematic sections, such as “Pirelli: Let’s Talk about Us”. It also contains a series of texts devoted to the company and its products, introduced by the first editorial, written by the then president Alberto Pirelli, through to the “Travel Tales” section, often in the form of sweeping photo reportages or accompanied by top-name illustrations. And then there is the world of sport, with stories of motor racing and soccer, cycling and sailing.

Mass mobility was discussed in “Society on the Move”, with new habits and forms of consumption, investigated in reports on television, education, and the relationship between work and leisure, as well as economic and political changes in Italy and abroad, advances in science and technology, and a close eye on protection of the environment and landscape. A truly multidisciplinary magazine could not fail to look at architecture and design, and art and literature, listening to the voices of those who guided and interpreted these worlds. The photographic illustrations are particularly interesting. Selected from a collection of 6000 negatives, slides, colour transparencies and prints, as well as black-white prints – they accompany the original articles, with almost 2500 previously unpublished photos, some selected for the anthology, others for use on this site.