The Hindu Business Line : Celebrating a new future

Life begins at 40. And that's the spirit underlying the next phase of life for apparel major Benetton of Italy, which chose to celebrate its 40th anniversary in style in Paris, where it opened its first international store in 1969. The celebrations featured Benetton's first-ever fashion show on the catwalk and a month-long exhibition of projects put together by Fabrica, Benetton's communications research centre.

Chairman Luciano Benetton sees the group scripting a new future again at 40, from Paris, a city that now more than ever stands for the capital of international fashion. "Our future is beginning again at 40 right here, just like in 1969, when the opening of the first overseas retail outlet, in Boulevard St. Germain, launched our expansion in the world," he said.

In its 40-year-long history, the most striking thing about Benetton has been its advertising, often startling and uncomfortable, even outrageous and tasteless, as some have called it. Many of its campaigns have been controversial, whether they featured prisoners on death row or showed a priest and a nun kissing, or a woman of colour breast-feeding a white baby. They featured models old and young of various ethnicities, in itself a distinguishing feature. Many of them shot by Italian photographer Oliviero Toscani, these campaigns have addressed various issues: racism, AIDS, hunger and starvation, sport, war, health.

However, at the Centre Pompidou in Paris, the venue of Benetton's fortieth birthday bash, what is prominently on show is not its campaigns. It is Fabrica: Les Yeux Ouverts (Eyes Open to the World and the Future), its exhibition of projects developed at its office in Treviso, Italy. Fabrica, set up in 1994, is a communications research centre whose activities span various fields, including cinema, music, interactive and new media, writing, photography and graphic design. The initiative of Luciano Benetton and Toscani, it grants young professionals from across the world a one-year scholarship to work on projects they have dreamt up. In a big, big way, Fabrica serves to communicate the corporate social responsibility initiatives of the Benetton group.

In fact, the only campaign of Benetton's that is exhibited at the Paris event is the Food for Life series, shot in 2003 to mark the start of the collaboration between the Italian company and the UN's World Food Programme (WFP), once again featuring disquieting images of bodies wracked by hunger as well as images of women from countries such as Afghanistan who have benefited from this initiative. The company is donating resources to help WFP supply clean water and healthy meals to over 75,000 children in Northern Uganda, where two decades of war have laid waste the country's economy and infrastructure. Benetton's donation will buy stoves, vessels and water tanks for schools in refugee camps there.

Fabrica features several interesting and innovative projects. One is the Colors notebooks, wherein a notebook bearing the name of Benetton's `magazine about the rest of the world' was sent out to young people in various parts of the world, including areas with restricted freedom of speech - it is filled with unedited and uncensored writings and drawings about issues that concern them, ranging from world peace, obesity and rape to abortion, George W. Bush and the recipe for rice dumplings from Guangzhou. There is even a book in Braille. The month-long exhibition, on till the first week of November, has themed photo exhibitions and also invites viewers to participate in interactive installations involving the real and the virtual.

"This exhibition is experimental and different from other ways in which the company is working, it is unique" says exhibition curator Marie-Laure Jousset, Chief Curator, Musee national d'art moderne. Says Renzo di Renzo, Creative Director of Fabrica, "Many organisations (NGOs) have no skills in communication, so we help them communicate better. We react to what people are asking us." Fabrica is responsible for many media campaigns for major organisations (Reporters Sans Frontieres, World Health Organisation) and it encourages "cultural cross-fertilisation and a global consciousness in all its fields of activity," says a note that profiles it.

The fashion show - the first time Benetton clothes appear on the catwalk, interestingly - featured its Fall/Winter 2006-07 collection, in wool. Men were featured in greater number, as were accessories, which are assuming greater importance in defining the Benetton look.

Founded in 1965, the 1.8-billion euro Benetton Group is present in 120 countries across the world with 5,000 outlets. Listed on the Milan, Frankfurt and New York stock exchanges, the family-run company in 2003 gave its managers greater responsibility. Its brands include the most famous United Colours of Benetton, fashion collections Sisley, leisurewear called Playlife and streetwear called Killer Loop. Apart from its involvement in social causes through Fabrica and its advertising, it is also involved with sport (rugby, volleyball, basketball and Formula One).

The group's plans for its Indian arm foresee it playing a larger role in South-East Asia from sometime next year, expanding retail presence and bringing in some new brands, but that's all that's being said as for the moment, the group concentrates on taking stock of its fortieth milestone.

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