The “Holidays in Ticino” map is a fine pictorial map created in 1939 by Otto M. Müller and commissioned by the Swiss Central Office for the Promotion of Transport in Zurich. Belonging to a series of eight maps dedicated to the entire Swiss territory, this map combines geographical precision and illustrative charm, immediately communicating the cultural, artistic, and gastronomic riches of the region. The vignettes, rendered with graceful lines and intense colors, are not mere ornaments but true stories in images, capable of uniting information and poetry and of highlighting, at the same time, the efficiency of the connections that allowed one to discover Ticino.
In the northern part, among the mountains and passes, the railway line comes to life several times with the presence of the train, along the Bellinzona–Biasca route or exiting the Gotthard tunnel. This choice is not only descriptive: in the Thirties and Forties, the Swiss Federal Railways promoted domestic and transalpine tourism, and its representation becomes a symbol of modernity and accessibility. Descending towards the shores of Lake Maggiore, the eye encounters typical boats sailing the waters of Locarno, Ascona, and Brissago: sailboats, small ships, and canoes, drawn with softness and warm tones, evoke an almost Mediterranean landscape and recall the elegant imagery of the “Swiss Riviera”. In the heart of the map, Bellinzona stands out with its UNESCO World Heritage castles, represented in a scenographic way and animated by figures in medieval costume, a sign of a living and participatory heritage. The outlines of Monte San Salvatore and Monte Brè, with the funiculars that go up the wooded slopes, tell of the ease of reaching spectacular views, while Morcote, with its bell tower and houses nestled on the lake, becomes the emblem of the harmonious fusion between architecture and nature.
This map is not an isolated work, but part of a broad editorial and promotional strategy. The Swiss Central Office for the Promotion of Transport, active since the 1930s, aimed to present Switzerland as a safe, well-connected and rich in variety destination. The maps, distributed in railway stations, fairs and travel agencies and often published in several languages, combined geographical clarity and visual seduction, managing to compete with the illustrated posters of the time. Müller’s pictorial approach, with smiling human figures, alpine fauna, artisanal and gastronomic symbols and infrastructure integrated into the landscape, gave the whole a rare balance between informative function and aesthetic suggestion: a geography transformed into a manifesto, an ideal bridge between the objectivity of the map and the promise of travel.
Otto Martin Müller, born in Zurich on March 16, 1913 and died in Affoltern am Albis on November 30, 2002, was a Swiss artist and graphic designer specializing in geo-pictorial maps and illustrations. After an apprenticeship as a lithographer (1928-1929), he trained at the Orell Füssli Art Institute, where he was influenced by German Expressionism and the Bauhaus. From 1934 he worked as a freelance graphic designer in Zurich and, as early as 1937, he received important commissions from the Swiss Traffic Center, for which he created maps of various Swiss regions, including the first large national map published in 1941, as well as those dedicated to Zurich, Graubünden and Ticino. Among his most famous works is the “Cheese Map of Switzerland”, commissioned by the Schweizer Käseunion and published in several editions between 1967 and 1994. His production also includes the geo-pictorial map of Sicily from 1957 and the “Carta Ideografica d’Italia” from 1965, both characterized by the same wealth of vignettes and by the immediate and narrative visual language that distinguishes his entire career.
