Facts, places, ways, names (with index), entries and an introduction by Alessandro Mendini. Chiara Alessi, curator and critic of design, presents new Italian design in a handy, slim volume “Dopo gli anni Zero” (Laterza, 150 p., 12 euros). In-depth critical analysis of the latest Italian design with poetics, distinctions, maps, areas of expertise and responsibility, connections with the past and structural perspectives. “Positive research, to say hurrah for people born around the 1980s”: the words of Mendini photograph the contemporary Italian design panorama and help to define its limits, and to understand its protagonists. Over 200 designers, mostly under 30, including neo-post, piece-makers, integrated designers, soft pop and retro chic designers, messengers, rhizomatics, metonymics and empiricists, to apply the terms used by the author. A section on special paper with illustrations and statistical data completes a work of research, to be read at one sitting. Also available in an ebook version.
