{"id":214259,"date":"2025-01-13T17:07:19","date_gmt":"2025-01-13T17:07:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/13\/oliviero-toscani-driving-force-behind-provocative-benetton-ads-dies-at-82\/"},"modified":"2025-01-13T17:07:19","modified_gmt":"2025-01-13T17:07:19","slug":"oliviero-toscani-driving-force-behind-provocative-benetton-ads-dies-at-82","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/13\/oliviero-toscani-driving-force-behind-provocative-benetton-ads-dies-at-82\/","title":{"rendered":"Oliviero Toscani, Driving Force Behind Provocative Benetton Ads, Dies at 82"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"text-align:center\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1050\" height=\"549\" src=\"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2025\/01\/13\/multimedia\/13toscani-01-jtwb\/13toscani-01-jtwb-facebookJumbo.jpg?fit=1050,549&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"Oliviero Toscani, Driving Force Behind Provocative Benetton Ads, Dies at 82\" title=\"Oliviero Toscani, Driving Force Behind Provocative Benetton Ads, Dies at 82\" \/><\/div><p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-0\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Oliviero Toscani, an Italian photographer who used images of an AIDS patient and death row inmates to break the boundaries of fashion imagery as the creative mastermind of Benetton\u2019s advertising campaigns, died on Monday. He was 82.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">His death was announced by his family on <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/DEv_ygEo39P\/?hl=en\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">Instagram<\/a>. They did not say where he died or cite a cause of death, but in August Mr. Toscani <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.corriere.it\/cronache\/24_agosto_28\/oliviero-toscani-intervista-2d151254-06a7-4243-9162-2574fb40fxlk.shtml\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">told<\/a> the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera that he had been diagnosed with <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hopkinsmedicine.org\/health\/conditions-and-diseases\/amyloidosis\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">amyloidosis<\/a>, a rare and incurable condition in which there is a buildup of protein.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">His <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.vanityfair.it\/gallery\/oliviero-toscani-campagne-pubblicita-piu-belle-celebri-foto\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">shock-and-awe campaigns<\/a> in the 1980s and \u201990s helped turn Benetton from a small Italian brand into a global fashion powerhouse, with <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.vogue.co.uk\/gallery\/benettons-best-advertising-campaigns\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">provocative<\/a> advertisements that blurred the lines between marketing and activism, high art and consumer industry.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">In one ad, an AIDS patient lay on his back, his mouth open, his hands curled on his chest. His dark eyes stared past his family, who had gathered around his deathbed. The patient, David Kirby, <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.icp.org\/browse\/archive\/objects\/united-colors-of-benetton-aids-david-kirby\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">looked almost Christ-like<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-1\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">And there, near the bottom right, <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/time.com\/4592061\/colorization-benetton-aids-ad\/\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">a few words hung in a green box<\/a>: \u201cUnited Colors of Benetton.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The advertisement, which ran in the 1990s, was one of the most provocative and divisive in recent fashion history, prompting furious debates over whether Benetton, and Mr. Toscani, were creating art, engaging in advocacy or exploiting the epidemic to sell its clothes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Notably, Mr. Toscani had the <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.icp.org\/browse\/archive\/objects\/united-colors-of-benetton-aids-david-kirby#:~:text=In%201990%20Therese%20Frare%20was,the%20images%20for%20personal%20gain.\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">Kirby family\u2019s permission<\/a> to use a colorized version of the image, which was shot in 1990 by the photographer Therese Frare. The Kirbys said the campaign had helped broaden awareness about AIDS.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cBenetton didn\u2019t use us, or exploit us,\u201d the Kirby family said, maintaining that this was a way for their son\u2019s portrait to be \u201cseen all over the world, and that\u2019s exactly what David wanted.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-2\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Toscani\u2019s ads were often socially progressive, with images of racially diverse and gay families. They were also meant to shock. He used pictures of horses copulating. He used the bloodstained <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/wwd.com\/feature\/benetton-again-stirring-it-up-with-latest-ad-1156390-1745889\/\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">uniform<\/a> of a soldier killed in Bosnia-Herzegovina. One ad featured actors dressed as a priest and a nun kissing.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-3\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cAdvertising agencies make millions by repeating the same old thing,\u201d he <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/1995\/07\/21\/business\/media-business-advertising-benetton-s-unrepentant-adman-vows-keep-pushing.html\" title=\"\">told<\/a> The New York Times in 1995, adding, \u201cWe try to go another way.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Toscani sometimes crossed the line even for Benetton. He joined the company in 1982 and left in 2000 amid an uproar over an ad campaign that featured photographs of <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/1999\/12\/27\/business\/media-talk-benetton-ads-offer-tour-of-death-row.html\" title=\"\">death row inmates<\/a> across the United States.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">He returned as creative director in 2017. But his career at Benetton came to an end in 2020, not because of the calculated and daring risks he had taken in photography and advertising, in which he delighted in his broadside challenges to conventional ideas of respectability. Rather, it was because of an offhand comment he made in a radio interview about a <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2020\/02\/06\/world\/europe\/benetton-oliviero-toscani.html?searchResultPosition=1\" title=\"\">bridge collapse in Italy<\/a> in which more than 40 people died. \u201cWho cares that a bridge collapsed?\u201d he had said. Though he apologized, Benetton fired him.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Italian <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.comune.milano.it\/en\/-\/oliviero-toscani-compie-80-anni-e-milano-lo-celebra-con-una-mostra-a-sorpresa-diffusa-in-citta\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">politicians<\/a> and <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/stories\/giorgioarmani\/?hl=en\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">creative<\/a> leaders honored him in social media tributes on Monday. The designer Valentino Garavani, the creator of Valentino, <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/DEwm6InMXPO\/?img_index=1\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">called him<\/a> \u201ca visionary who challenged the world through his lens.\u201d The designer Giorgio Armani wrote that \u201cthe directness and visual impact of his language set a standard.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Oliviero Toscani was born in Milan on Feb. 28, 1942. He followed in the footsteps of his father, Fedele Toscani, a photojournalist. Mr. Toscani trained at the Zurich School of Applied Arts and worked as a fashion designer before he joined the Benetton Group as art director in 1982.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-4\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">His survivors include his wife, Kirsti Moseng Toscani, and their three children, Rocco, Lola and Ali. Mr. Toscani was married twice before and had three other children. Complete information on survivors was not immediately available.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">In his final months, Mr. Toscani told the Corriere della Sera that he had lost weight while being treated for <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hopkinsmedicine.org\/health\/conditions-and-diseases\/amyloidosis\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">amyloidosis<\/a> and that his sense of taste had declined. Wine tasted different to him, he said. \u201cI am not interested in living like this,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">But in September, he <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/DAaWeauMGJX\/?hl=en\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">traveled<\/a> to the Museum fur Gestaltung Zurich <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/zuercher-museen.ch\/museen\/museum-fuer-gestaltung-zuerich-ausstellungsstrasse\/archiv\/oliviero-toscani-fotografie-und-provokation\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">for a major retrospective<\/a> of his work called \u201cOliviero Toscani: Photography and Provocation.\u201d It closed just over a week before he died.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cI have found out that advertising is the richest and most powerful medium existing today,\u201d he <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/1991\/07\/23\/business\/the-media-business-advertising-benetton-stirs-more-controversy.html\" title=\"\">told<\/a> The Times in 1991. \u201cSo I feel responsible to do more than to say, \u2018Our sweater is pretty.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-798hid etfikam0\">Elisabetta Povoledo<!-- --> and <!-- -->Matthew Mpoke Bigg<!-- --> contributed reporting.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/01\/13\/business\/oliviero-toscani-benetton-dead.html\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Oliviero Toscani, an Italian photographer who used images of an AIDS patient and death row inmates to break the boundaries of fashion imagery as the creative mastermind of Benetton\u2019s advertising campaigns, died on Monday. He was 82. His death was announced by his family on Instagram. They did not say where he died or cite [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":214260,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2025\/01\/13\/multimedia\/13toscani-01-jtwb\/13toscani-01-jtwb-facebookJumbo.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[7042,169206,169212,169209,163460,16,6455,169208,5401,156,169211,5474,169207,67240,169210],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214259"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=214259"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214259\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":214261,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214259\/revisions\/214261"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/214260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=214259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=214259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=214259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}