ETTORE SOTTSASS ALESSANDRO MENDINI

ETTORE SOTTSASS (1917-2007) Education: Politecnico di Torino - Faculty of Architecture Creative iconoclastic and dazzling, Ettore Sottsass has marked the history of Italian design: Olivetti Valentine is the revolutionary typewriter born in 1968, put into production the following year, from the project by Ettore Sottsass and Perry A. King, which earned Sottsass the Compasso d'Oro Award in 1970.** **With the Memphis group , a design and architecture collective he founded in the early eighties, Sottsass gives life to a real aesthetic of Postmodernism, far from the rigid and assertive dogmatism of functionalism. Distinctive features: vitality of the design, bright colors, geometric shapes, wise use of kitsch. The icons: The Carlton bookcase (1981) designed by Ettore Sottsass, Memphis poster. /

ALESSANDRO MENDINI (1931-2019)education: Politecnico di Milano - Faculty of Architecture Architect and designer, Alessandro Mendini is among the protagonists of the renewal of Italian design between the seventies and eighties. A leading figure in the field of Radical Design – from Global Tools to Alchimia in 1977, up to Memphis – he has linked his name to architectural projects, iconic furnishings and works of art, in the name of the most daring synergy between creative and design disciplines. His concepts of "neo-modern design", which breaks the rules of Modernism in favor of a postmodern syncretism; and that of "redesign", which gives a second life to existing objects thanks to decoration, visual displacement and the conscious use of kitsch. In 1979 and 1981 he received the Compasso d'Oro Award for design. The icons: the famous Proust armchair (1978); the corkscrew Anna G. and the Anna Pepper pepper mill for Alessi. /