[Leica] Taking up the cudgels for Francesco Illy

[rangefinder at screengang.com (Didier Ludwig)]

Chris

I can anser you - yes it is right. I will tell you why.

Francesco Illy, member of the italian Illy coffee dynasty and co-CEO of the 
company, and btw a passionate and brillant amateur photographer, has been 
sponsoring Salgado since many years. He is a big fan of him and promoted him 
already in his beginnings. Seen in this context, it is understandable you 
met Salgado prints in connection with Illy coffee promotion actions. 

I happen to work for Francesco Illy, or better said, for one of his 
companies, Amici Caff? Switzerland. I have recently redesigned the 
Illy/Amici website, see http://www.amici.ch (the Illy family sold the rights 
for their Illy brand for Switzerland 30 years ago that's why their  coffee 
is called Amici here). Mister Illy is that kind of old-fashioned patriarchal 
company leader, who is taking care of his employees like they would be his 
kids. He's not the kind of MBA bean counters that buy modern art just 
because it's fashionable. He is interested in photography because he's 
himself keeping that button pushed, too, on his Hassies.

Most of the pictures on the Amici website were shot by Mister Illy himself. 
I had to take out all the Salgado pictures of the old website because they 
had been used too much & too long (but they're brillant, I can tell, I have 
all of them as 40 MB greyscale Tiffs on my harddiscs).

To come back on Illy sponsoring Salgado, it is more than only a usual 
commercial thing. There's a relationship between F. Illy and Salgado. If you 
have the luck to know Mr. Illy and his passion for traditional b&w 
photography, you must say it's good there are some patrons left like him. 
There should be more of them.

And as Simone Tiraboschi posted earlier, Illy is one of the very rare coffee 
companies that trades in a fair and sustainable coffee market, decades 
before Max Havelaar "invented" the fair trade. As artist I would not 
hesitate to be sponsored by such a company. It's a great luck, and I guess 
Salgado's appreciating it.

Didier



 





>So I happened to be wondering through the Time-Warner mall at Columbus 
>Circle last week when I spied a lot of giant Salgado prints on display, (he 
>once used a Leica).  On each image there was a small caption about the 
>image and a plug for Illy, which I had never heard of before.  I assumed 
>Illy was some group sponsoring the exhibit.  At the conclusion of the 
>exhibit there was a coffee bar, an Illy coffee bar.  I was unhappy to 
>realize the whole thing was a PR campaign.  Now the question shot into my 
>mind...is this right?  I looked around at the mall and the shops and all 
>the people sipping the Illy coffee and then at the Salgado prints again and 
>the prints became reduced to corporate PR and I was angry.  Flame me all 
>you want but I realized two things - consumption has replaced democracy, 
>and the image is the driving force behind consumption.  It's all so rude.
>
>Chris Saganich - not happy with the world these days.