Oliviero Toscani (born 1942) is an
Italian photographer, best-known worldwide for designing controversial advertising campaigns for Italian brand
Benetton, from 1982 to 2000. Most of these advertising campaigns were actually institutionals for the brand, always composed of rather
controversial photography, usually with only the
company logo "United Colors of Benetton" as caption.
One of his most famous campaigns included a photo (by
Therese Frare) of a man dying of
AIDS, lying in a hospital bed, surrounded by his grieving relatives.
That picture was controversial due to its similarity to a
pieta painting.
Others include allusions to
racism (notably one with three almost identical human hearts, which were actually pig hearts, with the words 'white', 'black', and 'yellow' as captions),
war,
religion and even
capital punishment.
In the early
nineties Toscani co-founded the magazine
Colors (also owned by
Benetton) with American graphic designer
Tibor Kalman. With the tagline "a magazine about the rest of the world",
Colors built on the multiculturalism prevalent at that time and in
Benetton's ad campaigns, while remaining editorially independent from
Benetton.
In 2005, five years after his resignation from
Benetton following the controversy surrounding the death row campaigne, he sparked controversy again with his photographs for an advertising campaign for the men's clothing brand 'Ra-Re'. Their portrayals of men participating in
homosexual behaviour angered groups such as the catholic fundamentalist parents' association
Movimento Italiano Genitori who called the pictures 'vulgar'. The campaign came amidst on-going debate in
Italy about
gay rights.
Oliviero Toscani unsuccessfully stood as a candidate for parliament for the new
Rose in the Fist party in the
Italian general election held on
April 9 and 10, 2006.
In September 2007, a new campaign against
anorexia was again controversial due to his shocking photography of an
emaciated woman (
Isabelle Caro).
He is creating with La Regione Toscana a new research facility for modern communication called 'La Sterpia'.