Visual communication in Molfetta since 1980: food labels, publishing, branding and territorial marketing. Industria Felix Award 2023.

A visual communication company founded at eighteen and still standing after forty-five years. From screen printing to publishing, from packaging to territorial marketing.

"Those young people who created a job for themselves"

That's what La Gazzetta del Mezzogiorno called us. It was 1980. Stefano Salvemini and I were eighteen, with a worn screen-printing frame and very fresh ideas. We founded the Cooperativa L'Immagine in Molfetta together with Tonino, Giovanni, Saverio, Leo and Angelo, who left us shortly after, without knowing where it would take us. We invented the work ourselves. And when it didn't work, we kept at it until it did.

From screen printing we moved to art and advertising publishing, then to packaging for the food sector, to graphic design, to territorial marketing, to photography. Every step came from the curiosity to try something new and the stubbornness not to stop at the first obstacle. Obstacles, in forty-five years, were not lacking. Stefano is still here. It's not a detail, it means that when we decide to do something, we carry it through to the end. That's how it's worked since 1980.

What we do

We produce self-adhesive labels for the food sector, from olive oil cellars to wineries, from fruit and vegetables to bakery products. We create editorial and branding projects, books, catalogues and publications that turn a product or a territory into something you can leaf through, give as a gift, keep. And we build territorial marketing strategies for villages, destinations and networks of municipalities. Not off-the-shelf packages, every territory has its own story, and that's the one we tell.

Industria Felix Award 2023

In 2023, in Gallipoli, Editrice L'Immagine received the Industria Felix Award, in collaboration with Il Sole 24 Ore, as a company sound in management and reliable in financial terms within the cultural and tourism sector. Forty-five years of "inventing the work" didn't produce only ideas, but a company that holds up on the numbers too. The creative side shows straight away. The solid side shows when an award arrives that measures the balance sheets, not the intentions.

La Cassetta degli Attrezzi

> A concrete vision to share. Inventing a job where there was none, starting from a screen-printing frame and eighteen years of age
> Stubbornness as method. When something doesn't work, you keep at it until it does
> Curiosity to reinvent yourself. From screen printing to publishing, to packaging, to territorial marketing, without stopping at what you already knew how to do
> Perseverance of a two-person company. After forty-five years Stefano is still here, and that changes how you decide and how you see things through

What we learned

In forty-five years we changed trade more than once, but the lesson stayed one only. A job is something you can invent, as long as you're stubborn enough not to give up at the first no. We learned it together, the two of us. That's the reason we're still here.

Editoria e branding, https://www.editricelimmagine.it
Packaging ed etichette, https://www.etichettelimmagine.it

Nave Italia in Molfetta, the world's largest sailing brig and nine inclusion associations. Graphic design and communication by Gaetano Armenio.

Communicating the arrival of the largest working sail brigantine in the world in the harbour of my hometown. Three days, eight associations working on inclusion, a network of military and civil bodies to fit into a single image.

The problem comes before the celebration

The sheet was blank and everyone had to fit on it. The Italian Navy, the Tender To Nave Italia Foundation, the Harbour Master's Office, the Apulia Region and eight Molfetta associations that work every day with disability and hardship. Logos that carry weight, hierarchies that allow no slip-ups, an order that someone would read as a ranking anyway. They asked me to handle the communication of an event. The real part of the job was this: holding a network together without anyone feeling pushed into the background, and without turning a programme into an org chart.

The decision: the ship at the centre, the bodies around it

I built the visual identity around the ship, not around the institutions. In an official event that is a choice you have to defend, because acronyms usually win. The photograph of the brigantine fills the space, the logos sit where they belong without stealing the scene. This untied the knot of hierarchies. If the ship is at the centre, no body is first and none is last. They are all gathered around the same thing.

Four days, four audiences

Nave Italia does not carry passengers, it carries crews. It is a 61-metre sailing ship of the Tender To Nave Italia Foundation, the non-profit promoted by the Italian Navy and the Italian Yacht Club, and it hosts educational and rehabilitation projects for people with disabilities and psychological and social hardship. The sea and life on board are the tool, young people who for a few days become real sailors.

The programme had to read clearly for people looking for different things. The ship arrives on Saturday 27 June, welcomed by the Santa Cecilia Band of Molfetta. and the official welcome on board with the authorities and the start of activities with the associations. On Sunday 28 the visits open to the city, morning and afternoon. On Monday 29 it closes at the Auditorium of the Diocesan Museum with the Nave Italia Conversations, where Commander Matteo Malerba, neuropsychiatrist Tommaso Tota and Dr Gagliani of the Tender To Nave Italia Foundationexplain what it means to teach autonomy out at sea.

La Cassetta degli Attrezzi

> Visual identity built on the ship, to neutralise the problem of hierarchies between the bodies involved
> Coordinated graphics and communication, from the poster to the press materials
> A single visual system applied across four days with four different audiences
> The eight associations kept inside as protagonists, not as lines on a programme

What I learned

Handling the communication of an event wanted and organised by the cultural association Il Popolo Granchio of Molfetta (Bari) means finding the words for something that words risk betraying. A young person learning to trust the sea is not a moving story to sell.

It is a real achievement, and it has to be told with respect. The hardest part was not fitting five institutions onto one sheet. It was saying something delicate without making it weigh.

www.ilpopologranchio.it

Thirty years of Molfetta's Santa Cecilia Band on show at Sala dei Templari, 7 March 2026. Concept and graphics by Gaetano Armenio. 

Thirty panels, thirty years of history. And the microphone I was not expecting.

«Gaetano, take the microphone and speak»

Molfetta, Sala dei Templari, 7 March 2026, 7 p.m. The room was full and everything was still, waiting for who knows what. Then someone came up to me: «Gaetano, take the microphone and speak». I was not expecting it. I took the microphone and started from where it all started: 22 April 1996, fifteen people, one single conviction.

Thirty years to tell, not to celebrate

When the Santa Cecilia Band Association entrusted me with the design and coordination of the photography exhibition for its thirty years of activity, I understood at once that celebrating was not enough. It had to be told. "30 years of music and passion" is an exhibition path of more than thirty photographic panels, opened on 7 March 2026 at the Sala dei Templari in Molfetta, with the patronage of the City Council.

It retraces thirty years of history: from the founding in 1996 through the Holy Week of Molfetta, the Patron Saint Feast, the concerts and the music school. The funeral marches that accompany Apulian processional rites are not simply music: they are the sound identity of an entire region, kept with pride by associations like the Santa Cecilia Band.

La Cassetta degli Attrezzi

> Concrete vision to share: thirty years of sound history are not celebrated, they are told
> Building a narrative path, not a collection of photographs: each panel sets up the next
> Writing in a double register: the Molfetta local recognises the story, the visitor discovers it for the first time
> Communication on several levels: press releases, social content, interviews for local and regional media
> I handled the graphics, texts and visual identity of the exhibition.

What I learned

I wrote all the panel texts and looked after every detail of the communication. The one thing I had not planned was the microphone. They passed it to me with no warning and I started from 22 April 1996. The room knew that date by heart. The unexpected gets handled: it is the part of the job you do not write into the quote.

> Press

https://www.puglialive.net/30-anni-di-musica-e-passione-la-banda-santa-cecilia-inaugura-la-sua-mostra-fotografica-a-molfetta-il-7-marzo/

https://www.molfettaviva.it/notizie/trent-anni-in-musica-la-banda-santa-cecilia-racconta-molfetta/

https://www.laltramolfetta.it/banda-santa-cecilia-30-anni-di-musica-e-passione-in-mostra/

https://molfettalive.it/2026/03/03/trentanni-di-musica-memoria-e-identita-sabato-si-celebra-la-banda-santa-cecilia/

> Video

https://youtu.be/2LqefOHKLxo?si=sonJ6cNKMXslMgAd

https://telenorba.it/2026/03/09/molfetta-i-30-anni-della-banda-di-santa-cecilia-celebrati-in-una-mostra/

Photographic exhibition on Holy Week rites in Italy, Spain and Portugal, conceived by Gaetano Armenio.  Rome, Church of Sant'Antonio dei Portoghesi, and Molfetta, Sala dei Templari. 30 March-30 April 2025.

The embassies of Spain and Portugal to the Holy See, an inadequate lighting rig and the lights from my own bedroom.

I bring the lights from home

The room's lighting rig was not enough. Postponing or scaling down was not an option. I loaded the lights from my bedroom into the car and brought them to the Sala dei Templari in Molfetta. It was not a perfect exhibition. It was alive.

A bridge between three nations

I handled the concept, organisation and communication of PER CRUCEM AD LUCEM: an international photography exhibition dedicated to Holy Week rites in Apulia, Portugal and Spain. The aim was to tell European identity through fine art photography and to build a tourism promotion network around the Easter rites.

The exhibition had two venues: Rome, in the Church of Sant'Antonio dei Portoghesi, and Molfetta, in the Sala dei Templari. It was produced with the involvement of the Embassies of Spain and Portugal to the Holy See, the City of Molfetta and the FeArt Cooperative of Onofrio Grieco.

The network of towns it activated links Molfetta, Braga, Medina de Rioseco, Peñafiel and Bercianos de Aliste.

Ninì Vernola's performance

At the Molfetta opening, in the Sala dei Templari, I paired the exhibition with a theatrical performance by the unforgettable actor Ninì Vernola. A dense reading that touched on war and the suffering of the children of Gaza. It moved the audience. It drew criticism from the local institutions present at the opening. I do not regret it.

La Cassetta degli Attrezzi

> Build the network before building the exhibition: embassies, municipalities, confraternities and cultural bodies from three countries
> The unexpected gets handled, not postponed: the bedroom lights lit the photographs because there was no alternative
> Pair art with civic commitment: a performance that divides is a performance that touches something real
> I handled the concept, organisation, communication and setup of the photographic project.

What I learned

The lights from my bedroom lit the photographs for a month in a hall in Molfetta. The comment I heard most often from visitors was: «I did not think an exhibition could be this involving». They were not saying it despite the home lights. Perhaps because of them.

Rome – Church of Sant'Antonio dei Portoghesi

https://youtube.com/shorts/KZHbVOQgmJQ?si=fJcGicZmJt7Oc0F2

Molfetta – Sala dei Templari

https://youtube.com/shorts/SKtiV8vr7wk?si=G7-Fk8-yaSDw8cct

MASKS, a European project on traditional masks in Italy, Spain, Portugal and Romania. Twelve partners, three years. Communication by Gaetano Armenio.

Born from a WhatsApp chat between colleagues and approved by the European Commission: 12 partners, 4 countries, 3 years of activity.

From Valladolid to a European project

In 2019, during the exhibition Plenilunio di Primavera in Valladolid, some lecturers from the Spanish university had followed closely the work on communicating Apulian Easter rites. A few years later a message arrived on WhatsApp: they wanted to involve me in a European project on traditional masks, entrusting me with the international communication.

An informal conversation about masks and cultural identity. None of us thought that in a few months it would become a three-year project approved by the European Commission. MASKS was born this way, from an exchange between people who trusted one another before they even had a dossier to submit. From relationships built in the field, not from calls for tenders studied at a desk.

What MASKS is

MASKS works on the valorisation of the anthropological and zoomorphic masks tied to the age-old traditions of various European territories, bringing together research, training, visual arts and communication. The aim is to build a digital archive of the masks and the ritual practices connected to them, and to give international visibility to territories often outside the major tourist circuits.

The network brings together 12 partners among universities, training centres, research institutes and cultural bodies from Spain, Portugal, Romania and Italy. Two international exhibitions are planned in two European Capitals of Culture.

The lead partner in the project is the University of Valladolid in Spain, coordinated by Professor Maria Pilar Panero.

La Cassetta degli Attrezzi

> Know-how: the Spanish lecturers saw me work in Valladolid before they proposed MASKS to me
> Building relationships in the field, not only by email: trust is built in person, project by project
> Handling last-minute difficulties without making them weigh: it is part of the method, not an exception
> I designed and coordinate the international communication of the project: website, video, photographic reportage, social media

What I learned

MASKS is still ongoing. What I already know is that five years separate an exhibition in Valladolid from a project funded by the European Commission. In between there was no call for tenders: there was the quality of the work done and the trust of those who had seen it.

- Official project website:

https://www.unveilingthemasks.uva.es

- Institutional video:

https://youtu.be/dJ8aUiIu-kI

- Documentary on Tricarico (Basilicata):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vs-8td0RSw&t=7s

Field interview:

https://youtu.be/epYecj80BM4

Molfetta's Holy Week rites at BIT Milan 2025, with immersive video, Bassa Musica and scarcelle tasting. Concept by Gaetano Armenio.

On a commission from the town council I turned Molfetta's Easter into a trade fair format, with the local tourism chain inside the story. And two boxes of sweets gone minutes before opening.

The case of the missing scarcelle

Everything was ready. Stand set up, videos on a loop, scarcelle packaged. Minutes before opening, the discovery. Two boxes of scarcelle had disappeared. In the storeroom of the regional Infopoint, only the empty packaging was left in the bin. Some curious operator had already sampled the Molfetta tradition in preview. No panic. I had planned a secret backup supply, because at trade fairs you don't rely on surveillance alone. In a few minutes I reorganized the display and the tasting. The presentation started on time.

An Easter that becomes a tourism product

On behalf of the Municipality of Molfetta I handled the participation in the BIT, the Milan International Tourism Exchange 2025, as a tourism and cultural marketing project. The aim was to turn Molfetta's Easter into a trade-fair format able to stand out among hundreds of destinations and to speak to buyers, operators and media. I built an experience, not a stand. Immersive video projections on the Holy Week rites, the Bassa Musica "Città di Molfetta" as an identity element, and the scarcella, the sweet that symbolizes the local Easter, at the center of a guided tasting that became a moment of B2B relationship.

But you don't take a format to a fair on your own. Before Milan I built a network with the operators of Molfetta's tourism supply chain, hospitality, restaurants, guides. Not as suppliers, as part of the story. Each brought their own part to the stand: some the products for the tasting, some the itineraries to offer buyers, some the readiness to host groups during Holy Week. At the BIT we shared the promotion, so that a buyer wasn't buying an event but a territory ready to receive them. I conceived the concept, designed the multimedia content and handled communication.

La Cassetta degli Attrezzi

> Concrete vision to share: bring an Easter experience to the fair, not one more exhibitor among many
> Immersive videos, live music and a sweet to taste, because brochures aren't remembered
> Network the supply chain before the fair: hospitality, restaurants and guides sharing the promotion, so you sell a territory and not an event
> A secret backup always ready, because at trade fairs the unexpected is the rule, not the exception
> I conceived the concept and designed the multimedia content and communication
> Coordinate Municipality, Pugliapromozione, Infopoint, Bassa Musica and local operators under a single direction

What I learned

At the BIT, Molfetta's Easter stopped being just a religious event and became a structured tourism product. I had prepared a whole experience, video, music, tasting, and behind it a coordinated territory. Yet the buyers didn't remember the video or the stand. They remembered the scarcella, and the story of the ones that vanished.

Find out more

- Watch the video of the BIT event on my YouTube channel:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drpGPt281xk

- Find out more about Easter in Molfetta and the Holy Week rituals:

https://www.settimanasantainpuglia.it/en/cities/the-ti-te.html