plus and minus
giovanni belgrano
bruno munari
set of 72 slides; 48 transparencies, 24 solids | dimension cm 15.5x15.5 | full color throughout
first reprint august 2008
ages 4 years +
The visual game “Plus and minus” consists of 72 cards, each having a different image. Many of these images (48) have a transparent background and can thus be superimposed to compose more complex images and stimulate the child’s creative capacities. Superimposing some of the tree images creates a forest. Superimposing on the forest the image of rain or that of the sun or moon, or of a flight of birds, or of a passing dog, and so on, the total image can be continuously modified.
Not a book but a game, composed by several images on transparent backgrounds, which can be superimposed at one’s pleasure by adding or removing them. In these square cards the colour is perfectly balanced with the drawing, and together they simply tell stories, which are bonded together by the imagination of the players: the role of the authors is just to give different suggestions to let the players compose countless stories.
Bruno Munari (1907-1998) has been no doubt the most eclectic italian artist-designer. Since his very first experiences in the 30s among the artists of the Second Futurism, he always dedicated his creative activity to every form of “experimentation”, with a particular attention to the world of children and their games and toys. His works in the fields of painting, sculpture, design, photography and didactics cross their languages and poetics following the path of his very personal inventiveness
