Ettore Sottsass and the Social Factory catalog

In the summer of 2020, Miami’s Institute of Contemporary Art published a monograph titled Ettore Sottsass and the Social Factory to coincide with the exhibition of the same name. The catalog, designed by Mark Owens, features a wealth of images and archival material, with essays by Sven Lütticken, Jaleh Mansoor, Jacopo Galimberti, Francesca Balena Arista, Elisabetta Trincherini, Maria Cristina Didero, Silvia Franceschini, Evan Calder Williams, Ernesto Oroza, Wava Carpenter, and Gean Moreno. Unsurprisingly, Mark’s approach follows the iconoclastic architect’s bold use of shape and color, lending the catalogue a similar vibrancy that Sottsass imbued into his own wide body of work, which has been much-imitated and is perennially in vogue.

Owens chose Centra No.2 as the primary display font. Published by Sharp Type in 2017, it is Josh Finklea's take on the Modernist Geometric sans. Its wide letterforms and diagonally-sheared curvilinear terminals give the typeface a distinctive but sensibly matter-of-fact rhythm of negative and positive space. Applied to the Sottsass monograph, the font echoes both the Italian artist’s influential Memphis-era work, as well as Owen’s graphic design. Centra No.2 is featured as a display, of course, and is used as the titling font, but the catalog notably shows how versatile Centra No.2 can be as well, with its application as a supporting player beautifully numbering all 336 pages of the book.

Ettore Sottsass and the Social Factory was published by ICA Miami together with DelMonico Books/Prestel.