Under Mussolini: Decorative and Propaganda Arts of the Twenties and Thirties
The Estorick Collection

Aidan Campbell

I've always wondered why the Estorick Collection has received special treatment. You would think that in this day and age its collection of fascist art would be immediately picketed by the Anti-Nazi League for displaying material likely to cause offence to London's ethnic minorities.

But the Estorick has always focused on Italian fascist art and - unlike German Nazi regalia like the swastika - most people have been able to distinguish between the wonderful Italian art and design of the 1920s and the 1930s, and the reactionary political activities of the Mussolini regime. This small exhibition proves that point.

With its main permanent exhibition away on loan in Genoa, all six galleries of the Estorick have been given over to this visiting show. There are examples of chairs, chests, friezes, models of trains, carpet designs, lamps and vases - many of which have the brazen features of Il Duce stamped on them. Others follow fascist iconography in attempting to attach to Mussolini 's regime some of the grandeur that was ancient Rome. The interesting thing is, pathetic though these efforts sometimes are, the actual designs are dynamic and vivid and exciting. Italian, in fact. Guardian architect critic Jonathan Glancey is certainly no friend of fascism, nor even its art. Yet he once asked in exasperation: 'Why was democratic Britain unable to produce Modern architecture of a quality to match that of Fascist Italy?'.

Art is a peculiar thing. Nowadays we often measure the merit of past civilisations by the quality of their art. Yet, as the forthcoming Aztec exhibition at the Royal Academy will shortly show, sometimes the most obnoxious regimes have been responsible for producing superb art. In fact, there is no direct correlation between art and the society which produces it.

This brutal fact was ignored by Mussolini himself. As his regime crumbled under the combined assault of Allied armies and communist partisans, this exhibition shows how his particularly nasty Salo regime - confined to an increasingly small arena around the Northern Italian lakes - began to generate huge quantities of first-rate works of art. The Aeropuerto School alone qualifies as one of the most interesting examples in 20th century Modern art, and three of its excellent works feature in this exhibition (in gallery six, on the top floor). It is almost as if Mussolini wished to offset his political failures by artistic advances. The propaganda of the art replaces the propaganda of the deed.

When reality finally caught up with Mussolini in 1945, all this breathtaking art collapsed. 'Under Mussolini' begs a vital question in this age where imagery is celebrated above all else: what is the recipe for great art?

The Estorick Collection
39a Canonbury Square
London
Till 22 December

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