OVS is launching its second Arts of Italy project, a dialogue between art and fashion to support italy’s art heritage

Florence 12 April 2017.  We are now in the second year of the OVS Arts of Italy project. After the success of the first edition, launched last year, OVS has decided to continue its dialogue between art and fashion, promoting and making the most of Italy’s art heritage and contributing to making the immense historical and artistic wealth in Italy known to a wider public. 

 For the 2017 edition, in conjunction with the project’s curator, Davide Rampello, and his team, OVS has chosen to showcase the decorative arts. Mother-of-pearl inlays on a cameo, the painted arabesques on a ceramic plate, a finely carved breastplate, a glazed cup, the illuminated page of a manuscript, a wall hanging steeped in history, the embossed workmanship of a gold crown… There is an immense wealth of items and above all, of knowledge and techniques that have marked the history of art and craftsmanship in Italy. Wood, metal, ceramics, fabrics and stones are materials that thanks to the extraordinary work of artists and artisans have given a shape to genuine art works that for centuries have enhanced and embellished churches, royal palaces and noble villas. 

 These elements have provided inspiration for the limited edition Men’s/Women’s capsule collection by the creative team at OVS, on sale from 20 May at selected stores and online at ovs.it. Garments that are influenced by masterpieces of Italian art, often inappropriately considered of lesser importance, inspired by the decorative and symbolic motifs of some renaissance and baroque works from the collections of the Palatine Gallery and the Silver Museum in Palazzo Pitti, Florence, and the Poldi Pezzoli Museum in Milan. 

 For the OVS Arts of Italy woman, this edition is all about romantic, feminine style. Tulle, decorated with three-dimensional butterfly appliqués, shells and corals printed like paintings, cameos and mosaics with bold visual impact, enhanced with embroidery and macramé. Black, ecru and pink gold are the dominant shades, interrupted by colour accents stolen from gemstones. For men, the ornamental inspiration of the capsule collection brings back the horse armour of the 16th century.  Decorative patterns with chiaroscuro effects merge into casual lines for a range of everyday wear: T-shirts, bombers, shirts and trousers. The palette is immersed in a metallic grey that fades from black to white steel, on a base of cotton and jersey mélange. From all-over, high-definition prints to tone-ontone placed motifs. 

 For this edition too there, donations are being collected in OVS stores and together with proceeds of this capsule, they will be spent on restoring artistic works and monuments in need of care. This year, Italy’s leading fast fashion retailer has chosen to support Norcia, one of the towns that symbolise the earthquake that hit central Italy. Thanks to the collaboration of the Superintendence for Cultural and Landscape Heritage in Umbria and the Opificio delle Pietre Dure in Florence – one of the most famous and prestigious Italian research and training institutes for restoration of cultural heritage – this initiative will be contributing to the restoration of 17th-century painting “The Virgin and Child in Glory, Saint Scholastica and other Saints” from the Basilica of San Benedetto da Norcia, seriously damaged during the recent earthquake. As well as this restoration, there will be an Arts of Italy scholarship to attend the training school at the Opificio delle Pietre Dure, as a concrete means of support for the activities of restoration and to proceed with the excellent tradition that our country can boast in this field. OVS, in partnership with the Municipal Council of Norcia, Umbria Regional Authority and the I love Norcia association will be organising an amateur march and an exhibition and market of local artisan and food and wine products in Norcia on 14 May. 

To communicate Arts of Italy, OVS has chosen a front row of Italian faces, chosen from important artists and figures from show business and culture for an ad campaign shot by photographer Pierpaolo Ferrari. Protagonists, singer Emma Marrone, actors Ambra Angiolini and Valeria Solarino, writer Luca Bianchini, chef Davide Oldani, and director Giovanni Veronesi, who will be making a “short” dedicated to the project. Each one of them has been portrayed against a background of the work that inspired the item they are wearing, emphasising the bond between fashion and art that is the driving force of the whole project.