The German Pavilion at the 1961 International Labour Exhibition in Turin, held as part of the Italia ’61 centenary celebrations, was housed within the Palazzo delle Mostre exhibition complex. The German section was one of several international displays presented at the event, which was organized to mark 100 years of Italian unity. [1]
Design and History
Karl Oskar Blase (1925–2016), a German painter, sculptor, graphic designer, curator and professor associated with the Kassel School, is credited with the visual identity for the German Pavilion at the Turin exhibition. Blase studied applied art in Wuppertal from 1945 to 1949, and in 1952 became director of the America-Haus graphic arts studio in Bonn. He later taught in Kassel and co-founded the Novum group in 1958. [2]
Blase’s involvement with international exhibition design continued after Turin. In 1967, he was a member of the design team for the German Pavilion at the Montreal Expo. [2] His broader career included poster design, exhibition planning and display, and postage stamp design for the German Federal Post Office, for which he won numerous awards. [2]
Documentation specifically describing the visual form, color palette or typography of the 1961 Turin German Pavilion mark is not readily available in the sources reviewed. The pavilion’s display is documented in the Royal Institute of British Architects photographic archive, which includes a detail of the German section within the Palazzo delle Mostre. [1]
While Blase’s authorship of the Turin pavilion identity is not confirmed in the available sources, his documented role as a designer of exhibition graphics and his later work on the Montreal Expo German Pavilion design team establish him as a significant figure in mid-century German exhibition design. [2]
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