Programma

Moving to public management in 1998 through the Fondazione per il Libro, la Musica e la Cultura, it has recorded constant and growing success, also due to its mixed nature – exhibition/market, cultural festival, the opportunity for professional meetings, a special area dedicated to children and young adults – and the warm support of public institutions (Regione Piemonte, Provincia di Torino, Città di Torino), and foundations such as the Compagnia di San Paolo and the Fondazione CRT, partners like the Chamber of Commerce of Torino and private sponsors, publishers and the media which have always guaranteed impressive coverage.

The visitors, who have doubled in twenty years with numbers now stable at over 300,000 every year, have assumed a role as the true protagonists: strong, motivated and selective readers, who have enlivened thousands of meetings, debates, seminars and workshops.

Thanks to the International Book Forum project, the area for the trade in publishing rights supported by the Ice-Istituto per il Commercio Estero and Regione Piemonte, the Fair has been able to open up to an international dimension, attracting publishers and literary agents from all around the world to Torino. In 2011 the IBF reached ten years of life and, with over 6,900 meetings in four days, has made it possible for 700 trade professionals from 30 countries from all over the world to get to know each other. The presence of the countries guests of honour has also been much appreciated, from Holland in the 2000 edition to Russia in 2011, enabling greater understanding of often little-known cultures.

The Fair has demonstrated that it has known how to intercept and satisfy the widespread needs of a diversified and well-educated public, creating new ways to meet authors and the themed series of events linked to the different key topic chosen each year. It offers a combination of "high-brow" and popular, general and niche subjects. Its success is the origin of the blossoming of cultural festivals and events that has been seen throughout Italy, especially in the last decade. Today the Fair also represents a sort of "book new year", a sort of snapshot in which the critical assessment of the work done in the world of books and publishing makes it possible to discuss developments in the near future in this vast sector.