Text slightly modified due to a poor original English and the fact that the English text was lacking of almost a third of the Italian correspondent text.According to the positivist anthropologists of the late 19th Century, humanity became aware of its own conscience through dreaming. Transported by this intangible vehicle, and invisible part of man, the soul, could split from the body, travel beyond the limits of time and space and live another life, in a superhuman dimension, parallel to the earthly one. Generations of shamans, studied for thousands of years to extract substances that could expand the dream dimension until hallucinatory substances and practices became themselves vehicles toward the unexplored territories of the mind. Men of old observed creatures that moved by walking, running, sliding, flying and swimming, and the mysterious presences that moved in the skies: the sun, the moon, the stars, the shooting meteors and flashes of lightning that shot across the sky. To give an explanation to the phenomena, out forefathers imagined that they were manifestations of supernatural beings that they called gods. Gods of a pantheon in continuous movement, not only across the heavens but towards the world of men, transported but flying chariots and winged horses. The idea of chariots and vehicles in general, developed from ancient times in opposing directions. On one hand, one part remained associated with the world of mythology, becoming the iconographic reference for gentlemen's carriages and boats until the Renaissance and later, the allegorical place of their presumed divine relations, their magnificence and power.
On the other hand, scientific thought appropriated the idea of the vehicle, replacing decorative glitter with down-to-earth gears, seeking the driving force not in the illusion of magic but in water pressure, in the weight of sand, the tension of ropes or the elasticity of leaf springs. In the 1st Century AD Heron of Alexandria designed an hour-glass mechanism to exploit the weight of the sand. In 1200 Roger Bacon (?) wrote prophetically: "We will manage to construct machines capable of pushing great ships at speeds faster than the entire formation of rowers and needing only a pilot to direct them. We will give carriages incredible speed without the help of animals. We will manage to build winged machines, capable of rising up to the air like birds". In 1400 Leonardo designed deadly tanks and a machine that moved autonomously driven by leaf springs. While art had dedicated itself to the celebration of the magnificence of the lords of the time, it was science that tackled the invention of terrible machines to ensure their supremacy. It was the century the Enlightenment that produced the first vehicle capable of moving on land without being dragged by muscular force but by the pressure of steam: this was the cart designed by Nicolas Cougnot in 1769, conceived to transport gun carriages inside an arsenal. But 19th Century man was not satisfied with the idea of a vehicle condemned to land by the force of gravity, but wanted to explore the heavens and water that had been the territory of Aurora, the Hippogriffs and Sirens. He returned with new scientific fantasy and imagined interplanetary submarine vehicles: Jules Verne's commander Barbicane directs his bullet-vehicle towards the moon, hurled by the formidable cannon Columbiade, while Captian Nemo dived into the depths of the seas in the Nautilus. Those who had instead stayed with their feet on the ground wanting to conquer th realm of speed, a few years later had to deal with pistons and petrol. Conscious of challenging the laws of nature they arrogantly baptised their vehicles with the most high-sounding names like a simply Torpedo, which means Siluro. Years later, an unstoppable process of evolution and experience enabled the creation of masterpieces of engineering and form, the offspring of a team of designers or a sole creative genius, often forgotten. In extreme cases, some of these masterpieces turned out to be difficult to use as vehicles, but perfectly suited to the category of works of art. Man has always dreamed of possessing an object endowed with independent movement, able to transport him, overcoming the friction of the air, the gradient of the terrain, the force of gravity and the pressure of the water, but but for that dream to be perfect man wanted the object of his desire to be unique and uniquely his, a projection and representation of his ambitions. This metaphorical object is all-encompassing of cultures, ages and social conditions. the Hippogriff, the Nautilus, the stationary firetruck the we all drove on a merry-go-round, the surreal cars tuned by amateurs and artists, the Indians cabs completely covered by decorations, the coloured buses that are driven on the dusty roads in Africa, the huge lorries decorated with chrome on the American highways, the shuttles decorated with crystal details and sofas upholstered in faux leopard, the perfect one-offs of the fifties, the most beautiful car of the latest show, all these things are different faces of the same dream, Today the borders of this dream have been moved towards still to be explored and conquered territories, so that the infinite dream can live forever. These new territories are called New Energies and Zero Emissions.
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1945-1959
Shells
An entirely metal bearing body covers the mechanics, enveloping wheels, engine and interiors in a soft and supple shell.
The organic roundness also serves to give rigidity to the body sheet, the openings and windows are still small with thick pillars, Jaray's studies inspired the tear drop shapes from which a low and streamlined tail grew.
This is the third box, that housed luggage or the engine.
Rockets (gilda)
The conquest of the skies and space was the collective dream of the 1950s inspired by this, the futurologists predicted the era of flying cars. The space rocket style was applied to cars: panoramic domes, odd wings, and turbine air intakes sprung out on fusiform shells.
1953-1969
Lines
In the years of the economic boom, cars grew, their bodies became horizontal, stretched and streamlined, as if symbolising social dynamism. The concept of the line was born.
The belt separated the window from the roo, and the character defining line marked the side, the tail was flat and short. Inspired by Yves Saint Laurent's fashion, lines moved from round to the trapezium.
Design was rationalised and standardised, the enlarged radiator grille incorporated the headlights.
Baroque
The sparkling American life style became standard and was translated into exaggerated characterisation of cars. Popular luxury was born. streams of moulding and chrome, two-tone paints, the wings, fins, bumper, air intakes: the automobile Baroque contaminated the bodywork.
1969-1989
Boxes
The International Style embraced the car, celebrating and aesthetic standard rationalised, standardised and made socially compatible.
Bodies rose and became more compact in the two-box line, short or streamlined. pillars became thinner, leaving more space for glass.
Lines became geometries, the headlamps rectangular or pop-up, cancelled and standardised personality, chrome was replaced by matt black.
Wedge
Pure aerodynamics inspired by nature was countered by brutal effect of the spoiler and the wedge, gluing the car to the ground at speed. Low, moulded front end, inclined belt line, short high-cut tail.
The wedge shape becomes first a fad and then symbol of car dynamism.
1984- tomorrow
Bodies
Taste becomes globalised and uniform while the desire for individuality rows. Brand image brings a new expressive stability.
Breaking away from the angular, static nature of the boxes, the computer generates bodies first smoothed and then increasingly fluid and complex. The trend is towards the on-box. Headlights, bumpers and grilles are integrated into hyperbolic and heavy-built bodies, lines and forms lose their basis, becoming decorative.
Retro
With the Post-modern era, the recovery of styles and emotions lost in the globalisation process is celebrated. Brands rediscover or invent tradition. the front end is the strong element, chrome curves return. Applied to inappropriate dimensions and proportions, the classic line comes back.
New edge
The desire to generate a new, anarchic, hypermodern aesthetic marks the work of young computerised designers who ignore all rules. Rotundity and angles alternate with cross-bred forms in bodies strongly modelled, fragmented and recomposed in a 3D cubist collage.
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The modern car was born in the 1930s and became a mass product in Europe in the post-war period. The evolution of design stems in equal parts from technical development and aesthetic acceleration.
In a comparative analysis, thousands of models from 1945 to today can be grouped in four major families, that include twenty styles. Reconsigning them helps to understand the past of car design and where it is going.
1945 Fiat 1500 C
Style by Mario Revelli di Beaumont
Two seater coupe, one-off
Engine: 6 cyclinder, 1.500 cc
Top speed: 115 km/h
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1947 Fiat 1100 S
Two seater sport saloon, 401 units
Length: 3,9 m
Engine: 4 cylinder, 1.100 cc
Top speed: 150 km/h
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1947 Fiat 1100 S
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1954 Fia 8V "Vetroresina"Fiat 8V: one car, many bodies.
While factories struggled to turn out mass-production models to satisfy the growing demand for mobility, the design of the Fiat 8V appears as an open-eyed dream. In two years only 114 example of this exclusive racing berlinetta were built. While the results from Fiat Carrozzerie Speciali (Fiat Special Bodies) were seductive, the coachbuilders proposals left the public speechless. Even the names like "Red Devil" or "Supersonic" evoke unharnessed creativity. On the other hand transparent roofs, fins and mock jet engines were more for effect than substance. Yet, in their diversity, they evoke all the optimism and the touch of healthy madness of those years.
Two seater berlinetta
Length: 4.03 m
Engine: V8, 2.000 cc
Top speed: 200 km/h
The fiberglass-reinforced plastic body (fiberglass = vetroresina) weights only 48 kg
Production cars had a metal body
114 units produced
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1954 Fia 8V "Vetroresina"
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1954 Vignale Fiat 8V "Demon Rouge"
This interpretation of the 8V is equipped with a transparent roof
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1954 Vignale Fiat 8V "Demon Rouge"
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1960 Abarth 1000 Pininfarina record car
Holder of many international records at Monza
Aluminium body by Pininfarina on Fiat mechanics, tuned by Abarth. One-off model.
Engine: 4 cylinder, central-rear mounted, unit derived from a Fiat 600 one
2 overhead camshafts
Power: 105 hp at 8.000 rpm
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1992 Morelli Romboidale
One-off modelThe engineer and researcher Alberto Morelli used to design gliders.
The theme is that of conceiving a car "nose" as similar as possible to that of an aeroplane to cut air resistance. This explains the rhombus-shaped arrangement of the wheels, two on the central axis and two on the longitudinal central line, making it possible to taper the nose considerably and provide a minimal steering radius. The curving system is very curious: a selector for the steering ratio between the front and the rear wheel is installed behind the second seat.
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1956 Morelli M-1000
One-off prototype for road testThe evident advantages of the model in aerodynamic terms: the rounded nose, the drop shape on the side view, the stabiliser tails.
VW chassis and Fiat 1000 mechanics.
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1956 Morelli M-1000
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