The Tasteful Nudity Behind a 1960s Italian Vinyl Series
The journey to archive Mario Convertino's exceptional artwork
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Last week, I received a call from an unknown number, which I immediately sent to voicemail (as I’m prone to do these days). A cryptic text soon followed. “Hi Rachel. Have you been waiting on a parcel and accidentally entered a precise but wrong address?”
Two months prior, I had ordered a compilation vinyl from Italy off eBay. Everlasting Hits by Pierre La Blanc & His Orchestra. In a litany of errors, the record was confirmed to be sent to my old apartment that I lived in seven years ago. Through terribly translated Italian, I rushed to ask the sender to direct the package to my current address. Through terribly translated English, they confirmed they would redirect it. I crossed my fingers and prayed to the eBay gods that this was in fact true.
I had stumbled down this eBay rabbit hole thanks to Italian Disco Stories by Beppe Savoni (Disco Bambino) & Angelica Frey, a niche and historical (my two favorite attributes) resource for Italo lore. I also follow Beppe on Instagram for his amazing archival videos (highly recommend), and in January, he posted a video on Italian graphic designer Mario Convertino. From there, I made my way to Discogs to find more of Mario’s work, where I happened upon a portfolio of 350+ album cover artworks.
Practicing in the late 1960s-90s, Convertino produced electrically playful artwork. His use of color and pattern created hypnotic visuals reminiscent of the psychedelic era. Yet one black-and-white album cover of his, made early in his career, lured me in for its exceptional difference: Everlasting Hits by Pierre La Blanc & His Orchestra. A high-contrast, grainy image of a woman’s backside decorates the cover of this orchestral record. Abstract in composition, the white of the background bleeds into the figure’s contours, creating slivers of negative space like rivers bending on a map.
Released by Fontana as part of an unnamed Italian vinyl series, Everlasting Hits finds company alongside titles like The Spectacular Shirley Bassey and The Fabulous Nina Simone, among 7 other records. While these albums seem to have very little in common, the artfully nude photo series that decorates the jackets is hauntingly beautiful. Curves of waists, spines, and legs weave their way onto the covers, leaving plenty of space for the various title texts to rest. A study in light and shape, Convertino’s covers are reminiscent of photographer Robert Mapplethorpe’s nude series, made a decade later.
Rummaging through Discogs, I was hard-pressed to find images of all ten covers that were cohesive in capture and pristine in condition. I noticed that the back cover of each release included small thumbnails of each cover in the series, so, as any album art newsletter writer would do, I ordered Everlasting Hits off eBay to scan the thumbnails at the highest possible quality. Thank you to the Russian man named Slavo, who lives at my old address, for kindly offering to return this package to me (post bot text) so I could share this series with you all.
Find the rest of the album covers from the unnamed Fontana series below:
ICYMI: Earlier this month, I wrote a piece on blurry album covers for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. Think Janis Joplin, Marvin Gaye & Olivia Dean among many others! An incredible dream to write for music’s hallowed halls. Highly recommend subscribing to their newsletter if you haven’t already.
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Didn’t even realize it was a human on the first Convertino cover…thought it was a wine glass on the left with lots of negative space 😂 such beautifully abstract compositions!
Fantastic. Spare yet elegant?