L’Esercito Italiano by F.T. Marinetti
The cover for L’Esercito Italiano: Poesia Armata (English: The Italian Army: Poetry of the Army), a 1942 book written by F.T. Marinetti and published by Cenacolo in Rome. The theme of the book revolves around poetry and the Italian army.
The title of the book is a wonky rendering of Motor, Karl Sommer’s “speedy” display counterpart to his more popular Dynamo: on top of the letterforms generally being much rougher, the T lacks its top serif.
There’s also some actual type thrown into the mix: “Poesia Armata” is a quintessentially Italian geometric sans: Alessandro Butti’s Semplicità Nero. The remaining two faces are Rudolf Koch’s Kabel Bold and Landi. Just like Semplicità, this slab serif series was available from Nebiolo. Landi was their version of Welt-Antiqua. In the light weight known as Chiara seen here, some glyphs including A G R were modified from Hans Wagner’s original design for Ludwig & Mayer.
