Pirelli commissions new artistic works on ‘Resiliance’ for Annual Report

Pirelli’s 2019 Annual Report will feature new writing from Emmanuel Carrère and John Seabrook, and illustration by Selman Hoşgör. The Italian tyre manufacturer is continuing its decade-long tradition of “enriching” its report, entitled ‘The Road Ahead’, with new artist commissions. Pirelli says this helps to tell the company’s story “beyond the numbers alone.” The three artists have produced work based on the theme of resilience, or the “capacity to react, change and improve”, as Pirelli defines the word. While the theme resonates with the current context, Pirelli adds that the commissions were conceived before the changes imposed by Covid-19. However the emergence of the pandemic figure large in the pieces ‘Noon at our door’ by Carrère and ‘The Zoom brigata’ by Seabrook.

In his piece Carrère shares his reflections and reactions while writing a book during the pandemic: “We were all stunned by the fall of the Twin Towers, the mightiest historical event that had ever happened in our lifetime, but no writer, I think, thought that his novel about a love triangle or the first disillusions of his childhood had become obsolete after September 11, 2001. So what then? So it doesn’t matter: I’m continuing, correcting, putting the finishing touches to my book on yoga. It may sound ridiculous but – if yoga is what I think it is -, it’s not, and neither is trying to describe, not so much a little life, but through a little life, the aspiration to be who you want to be and the destructive forces that prevent you from being: our struggle, more or less, all of us. I go on like this: this is my form of resilience”.

John Seabrook meanwhile sketches a dialogue between friends on a virtual platform during the pandemic. His piece references a cornerstone of Italian literature, Giovanni Boccaccio’s Decameron, originally published in the context of plague: “Did you know that The Decameron was one of the first books printed?” “But what does The Decameron have to do with the Renaissance?” one of the brigata asked. “Only everything,” I replied. “Think of it: the world is ending, and five years later comes the first epic prose masterpiece of modern western literature. The canon begins with Boccaccio. And the moral of his story is, ‘As long as there is storytelling, humanity will go on.’ Even the Black Death couldn’t quench that life force. Is there a better example of human resilience in the face of unimaginable adversity than the Decameron?”

The two authors’ texts are accompanied by eight illustrated panels by Hoşgör, known for his colourful, playful and dynamic style. The panels are based on key words and phrases with which Pirelli identifies itself: Artificial Intelligence, Changes, City of Future, Connection, Resilience, Smart mobility, Sustainability and Velocity.

Artistic history of Pirelli’s Annual Report

Pirelli’s collaborations with writers and artists is part of a long tradition which has led, over the years, to the involvement of many international personalities from the worlds of art and literature who have enriched Pirelli’s annual reports which creative content.

The 2010 annual report, for example, was illustrated by photography students from Naba di Milano, who were asked to interpret the theme of sustainability. In 2011, it was the turn of the designer Stefan Glerum, who interpreted values typical of Pirelli such as trustworthiness, speed, technology and innovation. In 2012, instead, the Annual Report was enhanced by the work of New Yorker cartoonist Liza Donnelly, who interpreted in graphic form ten words chosen by a group of university students from around the world embodying the values they considered most significant for their future. In the 2013 annual report, on the other hand, the author and scriptwriter Hanif Kureishi coordinated 10 young international talents who reworked the idea of the “wheel” in the project “Spinning the Wheel”.

In 2014 it was street art’s turn in Pirelli’s integrated annual report, with three works by the Brazilian Marina Zumi, the German Dome and the Russian Alexey Luka, who examined themes typical of street art such as the road, mobility and multi-culturalism. The following year, in 2015, Pirelli engaged the Russian artist Pokras Lampas, an exponent of modern calligraphy, to represent the value of “uniqueness” (hence the volume’s title “Every Mark is unique”) using graphic elements and fingerprints. The Annual Report featured the text “Like the sentinel moon” by the writer Javier Marias.

In 2017, the Annual report “Data meets passion” told the story of Pirelli’s digital transformation with the volume’s artistic and written contributions coming from the artist Emiliano Ponzi and three writers of international fame: Mohsin Hamid, Tom McCarthy and Ted Chiang.

Finally, the 2018 annual report, was dedicated to the 25th anniversary of ‘Power is nothing without control’, the slogan with which Pirelli is identified worldwide. To mark the occasion, the volume included images that evoked the concept ‘Power without control’ and with pieces from three authors of international fame: Adam Greenfield, Lisa Halliday and J.R. Moehringer.