The chef calendar

On its 22nd edition, Lavazza has decided, for the first time, not to portray beautiful women in its calendar, but some great chefs. This is a sign of how times change with regards to this cult-object, which was previously signed by masters of photography such as Helmut Newton and Annie Leibovitz and this year will give a view through the lens of German photographer Martin Schoeller (a scholar of Leibovitz) in a creative partnership with Armando Testa.

The photos in the calendar were unveiled yesterday in Milan, in an event in which, among others, participated Carlo Petrini, founder of Slow Food and of the Università di Scienze Gastronomiche in Pollenzo, the school which will receive from Lavazza funds to support new generations of chefs thanks to the "Young Inspiring Chefs" scholarships. The protagonists of the calendar are already widely visible on the Internet, namely Ferran Adrià, Albert Adrià, Massimo Bottura, Michel Bras, Antonino Cannavacciuolo, Carlo Cracco and Davide Oldani, that is to say, as mentioned in the official presentations, the «chefs and innovators who for years have been conquered by Lavazza and have re-interpreted this coffee it through their creations». It’s not a surprise, for us at Identità, but a news that is certainly important and effective for the larger public.

So Ferran, the greatest chef of the past 30 years, opens the Calendar immersed in a large bubble of inspiration (the overall theme of this work is indeed "Inspiring chefs"). Massimo Bottura, master of dialectics, is portrayed inside the Biblioteca Ambrosiana dressed as a magician-alchemist, among books and ampoules. Carlo Cracco is instead a falconer inside a barn, with a hen sitting on his arm while he holds a perfect egg, his true gastronomic icon. Davide Oldani is portrayed in a paddy field, like those of his childhood, speaking of local products and rice grains. Cannavacciuolo, already author of a fun campaign, one against the other with Adrià himself, is instead a new Ulysses beyond Hercules’s columns, with a siren suddenly surrounded by grills and gilthead bream.

French chef Michel Bras is just like you would imagine him to be: surrounded by nature. He’s surrounded by butterflies, in contemplation. The list closes with Albert Adrià, in a shot in which he looks at ease in the various kitchens around the world, while his brother is precariously drinking an espresso. The creative team «imagined them as jugglers, immersed in bubbles of thought, as philosophers of nature, searching for the essence in life, rediscovering their origins, may these be the white canvas of a rice grain, the volumes that illustrate our past, or the sea, from which all is born”, commented Francesca Lavazza, Corporate image director of Lavazza.