In his Notes From The Silence manifesto in May 2020, Gucci creative director Alessandro Michele spoke of ‘suspended time’ and the need to change the pace of fashion, its format, and its relevance. Eschewing the traditional runway for subsequent collections has become a part of his new modus operandi, starting in July with the 24-hour Epilogue campaign shoot with Alec Soth in the Palazzo Sacchetti for Gucci Resort 2021 and continuing with GucciFest — a world-first online fashion film festival championed by Gucci from November 16 – 22.
GucciFest not only reveals the house’s Spring Summer 2021 collection in the form of a miniseries directed by Michele with the celebrated Hollywood director Gus Van Sant, the week-long event also gives the digital stage (and Gucci’s global reach) to a suite of young fashion designers and filmmakers to show their short films too.
Like many works in his 35-year career, Van Sant’s 7 episode series plays heavily on suspended time, a concept that surely played a considerable part in Michele’s creative exchange with the American director. Shot in and around Rome, each episode follows the waif-like blonde Roman actress Silvia Calderoni through her hometown, as she encounters a slew of characters both real and imagined, from the Spanish trans philosopher Paul B. Preciado to the American playwright Jeremy O. Harris, British singer songwriter Arlo Parks, and the Italian art critic Achille Bonito Oliva. Not to mention, Harry Styles.
Entitled At Home, In The Café, At The Post Office, The Theatre, The Neighbours, At The Vintage Shop, and A Nightly Walk, the seven episodes revealed night after night paint a candid portrait of Gucci today – both ultra-gritty and phantasmagoric, youthful and global in its gaze whilst remaining firmly anchored in the elegant, philosophical subplots of Michele’s work.
A Magazine Curated By sat in on a conversation with Alessandro Michele and Gus Van Sant on Friday November 13th 2020. The following excerpts reveal their thoughts on working together in Rome this month, on a race to their digital finish line.
GucciFest premieres here at 9pm CET November 16th, with new films revealed daily until Sunday November 22nd.