Emanuele Farneti: the first Italian edition of AD 100
Not the usual list of the 100 top designers of the year: the Italian edition of AD puts the spotlight on the 100 gamechangers (in the paper and on the website). “People whose work is changing the rules,” as the director says.
It’s not a ranking, Yet, when a newspaper publishes a list, no matter how lengthy, it takes on the responsibility for its decisions. This is, of course, part of our job, because on paper (unlike in the digital world), space isn’t infinite, and editing means precisely deciding what to print and what not, taking the responsibility and any credit.
In the first Italian edition of AD 100, a very popular format with many of our international editions, we have made some decisions. With a warning. We didn’t want to produce a string of the best furnishing designers, architects and professionals, which is what many others do – there have been enough, perfectly good, lists.
What we did was to reflect on the fact that, as the sector AD is involved with is undergoing radical change, it made sense to work on a list of people who were changing the rules of the game, in different ways and in different disciplines – 100 gamechangers.
Multimedia platforms. Digital art, NFTs. Diversity, inclusivity, sustainability. Video-making. 3D printing. Green architecture and, why not, flower design. Do It Yourself.
Galleries straddling the line between different disciplines and professions. Social media, gambling even. The thoughts of the people who work here are radically changing the way we conceive design and narrate it – it is their 100 stories that we are publishing this month.
By its very nature, it’s not a definitive list, because it’s charting a constantly changing area, in which the confines are mobile or perhaps non-existent. It is, however, an attempt at drawing up a map for starting to navigate this new landscape, and a useful work tool for those on the hunt for talent.
Francesco Risso, creative director of the fashion label Marni is undoubtedly a gamechanger, harnessing freedom and poetry in his work, as someone who knows the rules and can therefore allow himself to infringe them. He does the same in his own house, completely hand-painted in bright colours over lockdown. There was just time to publish it on the cover of this edition, which has probably already changed – following the spirit of the times, or the next dream.
In any case, to paraphrase, you never go into the same house twice.
From the editorial by Emanuele Farneti, Editor-in-chief
Credits
Photo: Courtesy AD Italia
Magazine: AD Italia
Publisher: Edizioni Condé Nast S.p.a.
