Fiera Internazionale delle Attività Agrumarie, delle Essenze e degli Oli

Browsing the web looking for graphic references in my home region, I came across a postcard that immediately caught my attention. Its appearance recalled all the stylistic elements of the posters typical of Italy at the beginning of the 20th century. Today, in my area (Reggio Calabria, located in the extreme south of Italy), it is rare to find materials of this quality and style, so it was a real pleasant discovery. The postcard advertised the thirteenth edition of the Fiera Internazionale delle Attività Agrumarie, delle Essenze e degli Oli (International Fair of Citrus, Essences and Oils).

 The first edition of this fair was held in 1948, immediately after the II World War, and continued until the 80s. My area has always been renowned for the production of citrus fruits, in particular bergamot, a citrus fruit of which the Calabrians are specialists and which supplies the essence used to create perfumes all over the world. The authors most present in the production of posters for the Reggio citrus fair are Nunzio Bava and Mario Puppo.

 Nunzio Bava (1906-1994) was a renowned Italian painter, considered the most important representative of verismo in the Calabrian art scene of the twentieth century. He was born in Bagaladi, he spent his childhood in this place before moving to Reggio Calabria, where he came into contact with the local artistic environment. In particular, he was mentored by Umberto Marasco, a talented decorator whom Bava considered his “teacher”. He attended the Mattia Preti art school in Reggio and during this period he collaborated with drawings of Calabrian landscapes and figures inspired by the traditional Calabrian costume for various newspapers and periodicals with drawings of the Calabrian landscape and of figures inspired by the costume of his region. One of his most famous paintings is “I lavoratori” (The Workers, the artist investigates the Calabrian society of his time often painting slices of daily life). Bava was fascinated by the movement of the Macchiaioli and by Luministic painting. He participated in about 150 national exhibitions and organized several personal retrospectives in various cities. He received numerous awards, including the Ministry of Corporations Award in Rome in 1934, the National Exhibition of Mediterranean Art in Palermo in 1946, the IV National Exhibition of Contemporary Art in San Benedetto del Tronto in 1955 and the I National Biennale of Sacred Art of Bologna in 1954.

Mario Puppo, born on February 8, 1905 in Levanto, distinguished himself as a talented graphic designer and illustrator. Already in the 1930s, in his studio in Chiavari, he began to create brochures to promote seaside and mountain indications. In 1941, his works were exhibited in Milan in the Advertising Graphics salon at the National Exhibition of the Fine Arts Union. He also collaborated in the creation of covers for musical scores, catalogs and brochures.
 

However, it was above all in the 1950s that Mario Puppo designed a large number of tourist posters which dominated the market at the time. He also made posters for plays performed in the theaters of Ostia and Pompeii. In 1937, Puppo created the annual calendar for Barilla, printed by Amilcare Pizzi in Milan. This calendar was characterized by realistic drawings in shades of blue, influenced by the Deco style, which showed various human activities such as sport, study, work and military life, together with the products of the pasta factory.