Oliviero Toscani, photographer famed for provocative Benetton ads, dies aged 82

ROME – Italian photographer Oliviero Toscani, best known for his work on Benetton’s provocative advertising campaigns in the 1980s and 1990s, including one featuring an Aids sufferer, died on Jan 13 aged 82.

Toscani, who spent two decades as art director for the fashion retailer, revealed in August 2024 that he suffered from amyloidosis, an incurable disease, and had lost 40kg.

Asking for privacy, his family said in a statement on Instagram: “With great sadness we announce that today, Jan 13, 2025, our beloved Oliviero has embarked on his next journey.”

Toscani was known for using viscerally shocking images to not only sell products, but also draw attention to social themes, such as Aids, racism and the death penalty.

Most controversial was his use of a photograph of Aids sufferer David Kirby on his deathbed surrounded by his family for a 1992 Benetton campaign during the peak of the health crisis in the United States.

The campaign sparked a backlash by Aids activists and a boycott of Benetton, but Toscani stood by his work.

In a 2016 interview with a photography blog, he maintained that a company had a responsibility to “show its social intelligence and sensitivity to the society around it”.

Benetton on Jan 13 paid tribute to Toscani’s work.

“To explain certain things, words simply don’t suffice. You taught us that,” the firm said. “Farewell Oliviero. Keep on dreaming.”

Backlash, censorship

Toscani’s work for Benetton – from 1982 to 2000 and again from 2017 to 2020 – was both applauded and reviled.

It included campaigns featuring a black woman breastfeeding a white child, a nun and priest kissing, a still-bloody newborn with umbilical cord attached, and an array of colourful condoms against a white background.

Beyond consumer backlashes and boycotts, some of his United Colours Of Benetton campaigns were censored in Italy and France.

Some of his other work was similarly controversial.

Toscani’s 2007 photograph for fashion brand Nolita of the nude and severely anorexic French model Isabelle Caro – who died of the condition at age 28 in 2010 – was timed to correspond with Milan Fashion Week.

It was shown on billboards with “No Anorexia” over the photo.

A 2012 calendar he did for a leather consortium in Florence depicted twelve penises, following another version using female genitalia.

“Photography is ethical engagement. I don’t give a damn about photographic aesthetics,” Toscani told the Corriere Della Sera newspaper in August 2024.

Asked which photo he would like to be remembered for, he told the paper: “For the entirety, for the commitment.

“It is not an image that makes history, it is an ethical, aesthetic, political choice to make with your work.”

Born on Feb 28, 1942, in Milan, Toscani was the son of a respected Corriere photographer and attended art school in Zurich.

He worked in fashion photography, collaborating with top fashion names, including his eventual long association with Benetton.

The retailer broke ties with Toscani in 2020, however, after dismissive comments he made about the 2018 bridge collapse in Genoa that killed 43 people.

The Benetton family was the main shareholder of the company that managed the bridge at the time of the disaster. AFP