“Il Progetto Raccontato – La Mostra dei 40 anni”, which puts Auto&Design in the spotlight until 10 November, was inaugurated on 18 June at the Turin National Car Museum. A journey in time through four decades, from the 1980’s to the 2010’s, covering the extent to which journalism has developed, in parallel with the changes that have impacted the world, particularly car design. The pride of the exhibition is the display of a selection of concept cars together with the original drawings and the magazine’s design stories, which can be downloaded in digital format.
The forty years of Auto&Design are a celebration for everyone: for those who founded the magazine, for those who work on it today and for the designers who have always seen their projects published. For the occasion Giorgetto Giugiaro revealed a secret that he had kept hidden for 56 years: “In 1963 I was asked to contribute some drawings to the first issue of Style Auto (which would become Auto&Design in 1979, Editor’s note). But I was working at Bertone and I couldn’t use my name to sign other drawings,” he said during the press conference. “For the friendship that bound me to Fulvio Cinti, founder of the magazine, I did the drawings anyway, using the pseudonym Paul Sibylle, in homage to my mother’s maiden name”.
There were many testimonies from designers who have seen the story of their projects told in the pages of the magazine. “Seeing a car you’ve designed on display in an exhibition always makes an impression. I started reading Auto&Design when I first started designing. I was also responsible for a column on car styling and it’s a magazine that has accompanied me throughout my career”. Lorenzo Ramaciotti, former head of design at Pininfarina and the FCA group, remembers his ties with our magazine on his first visit to the exhibition.
More than 170 guests attended the opening dinner, including many style managers from coachbuilders and car manufacturers of yesterday and today. “This exhibition is about change. Only today do we realise that many of the elements we see on the concept cars of the past on display here have become reality”, comments Mitja Borkert, Lamborghini’s design chief, while between one course and the next, he does a paper sketch of what he calls the “design dna” of the Sant’Agata Bolognese company. Next to him Mike Robinson talks about the creation of the Alfa Romeo Pandion, chosen as the symbol of the exhibition, at the time when he was responsible for design at Bertone.
It is one of the 20 models that await visitors to the Mauto, together with – among others –the Italdesign Machimoto, Pininfarina Mythos, Fiat Maggiora Scia, Alfa Romeo Proteo, Lancia Dialogos, Citroën C-Airdream, Ford Evos, Volvo YCC and Mercedes-Benz C 112, all on loan from the collections of the manufacturers and design centres that created them. A magnificent, exclusive birthday gift.
