ETTORE SOTTSASS AND THE SOCIAL FACTORY “connects Sottsass’ production to momentous postwar economic and social changes,” and is on view in Miami until October.

“During il miracolo economico, Italy went from being a low-cost manufacturer to an economy that used design to create premium products it could sell around the world. Fiat would stop building the faintly comic Topolino in 1947, and move towards the formal brilliance and technical innovation of the Cinquecento in 1959… In the space of twelve years, Ettore Sottsass went from building workers’ housing and designing fruit bowls made from knitted wire to being called in by Olivetti to design a computer.” —Deyan Sudjic*

ETTORE SOTTSASS AND THE SOCIAL FACTORY

Through October 6.

Institute of Contemporary Art

61 NE 41st Street, Miami.

*Deyan Sudjic, “Post-War to America,” in Ettore Sottsass and the Poetry of Things (London: Phaidon, 2015), 104.

From top: Ettore Sottsass, Monumento di Merda Alle Patrie, 1966, photograph © Silvia Ros, courtesy of Kim and Al Eiber; Ettore Sottsass, Mobili grigi, 1970, fiberglass, manufactured by and courtesy Centro Studi Poltronova, photograph by A. Fioravanti and Sottsass, © 2019 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York, and ADAGP, Paris; Ettore Sottsass and the Social Factory, 2019, Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami, installation views (3), photographs courtesy and © Silvia Ros;