The Images of Consent
Symbols, Myths, and Propaganda on the Covers of La Rivista Illustrata del Popolo d'Italia (1923–1943)
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.82068/pgjournal.2026.23.42.05Keywords:
Political Design, Visual Propaganda, Fascism, Illustration, Visual CommunicationAbstract
This article examines the covers of La Rivista Illustrata del Popolo d'Italia (1923–1943), one of the primary instruments of visual propaganda of the Fascist regime. Through a thematic and iconographic approach, the study identifies recurring narrative clusters, ranging from Roman antiquity to industrial modernity, from the cult of the body and sport to productive rurality, and finally to the depiction of everyday life. It highlights how imagery was employed to construct and disseminate an aesthetic of consent. The covers, created by prominent artists and graphic designers of the period, such as Mario Sironi, Paolo Garretto, Bruno Munari, Fortunato Depero, and Alberto Salietti, reveal the hybrid and strategic nature of the Fascist cultural project, in which art, ideology, and visual communication converge into a grammar of power. The analysis offers an exemplary reading of the main figurative and rhetorical constants that define the regime's visual imaginary, positioning the magazine as a central node in the production of Fascist visual culture and as a device for identity construction, without implying any form of legitimation or value judgment regarding its communicative effectiveness.
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