In 2017, Bologna Children’s Book Fair decided to commission a young artist from the many talents selected for the Illustrators Exhibition to create the fair’s visual image, under the guidance of Chialab Design studio.
We felt the time had come to hand over the task of our visual image to the world of illustration, a major player at the fair since the very outset.
This was how the “BCBF Visual Identity Workshop” got underway together with Chialab, the design studio in charge of the event’s visual identity practically every year since 2009.
This intense joint design collaboration between the design studio and illustrator begins during the spring and has its first public appearance at the Frankfurt fair in early autumn before becoming the visual image of all facets of the Bologna Children’s Book up until the next edition.
Following on from the success of the fresh invigorating image given by the Italian Daniele Castellano in 2017, subsequent years saw extremely productive partnerships with talented young illustrators from several different countries.
In 2018, the book fair’s visual identity was developed by the French illustrator Chloé Alméras. In 2019, it was the turn of the Russian artist Masha Titova, while the 2020 visual identity of the completely new Special BCBF Online Edition was the work of the Lithuanian illustrator Rasa Jančiauskaitė. For the fifth edition of the “BCBF Visual Identity Workshop” in 2021, Chialab and the BCBF team have chosen the Parisian illustrator Jean Mallard, among the winners of the 2020 Illustrators Exhibition and of the 2018 ARS IN FABULA scholarship jointly instituted by the ARS IN FABULA School of Illustration and BCBF. In 2022, the Chialab working group guided the Mexican illustrator Sólin Sekkur towards the creation of what was to be the visual identity for return in presence of Bologna Children’s Book Fair, in 2022. For 2023, on the occasion of BCBF's 60th anniversary, Chialab shared the challenge in a collective workshop, in order to create a 20-handed visual identity and convey the scenes and characters - that BCBF has welcomed and hosted over 60 years - in a single unified vision. Then, to astound visitors at the 2024 edition Chialab opted for the calm and peaceful strokes of young Portuguese illustrator Inês Oliveira.