APCOM

A 30 million dollars global communication campaign which will reach the major cities of the whole world to promote tourism in New York was presented this morning in Milano, in the elegant settings of the "Four Seasons Hotel" bang in the heart of city's fashion's crossroads.

The choice of Milan as first stop of the new initiative is no coincidence: "Italy is style, This is Style, This is New York" is the claim chosen for the launch of the campaign in the Italian city. "Shopping and fashion are only the beginning of what Milan and New York share" said, during press conference, George Fertitta CEO NYC & Company, the official New York tourism and marketing company. Fertitta explained that after Milan the tour will reach other capitals and countries such as London, Ireland, Spain, Russia, Sweden, Brazil, Tokyo, Shanghai, South Korea, Benelux, Germany.

The campaign also entails the broadcast on two major Italian national channels of an add which portrays a family visiting New York. As CEO NYC & Company explained: "Since 2003 Italian tourism has risen: New York is now number one destination of Italian visitors". A claim bolstered by recent figures which show a 34 per cent increase of Italian visitors in New York last year, with 425 thousand tourists in the Big Apple during 2007.

One of the major cultural and artistic attractions is indeed the Metropolitan Museum where, as President Emily Rafferty explained during the press conference: "Italian art plays a major role with the first gallery entirely dedicated to Tiepolo". Among next year's exhibition, she also anticipated, are a retrospective on Giorgio Morandi - one of the most admired Italian painters of the twentieth century - and the exhibit "Love and Marriage in the Renaissance art in Italy".

City Town culture assessor Vittorio Sgarbi praised the initiative and stressed the strong bond between Milano and New York, tied, he said: "by a heavenly symmetry".