The complete program of GucciFest

The classic format of the fashion show comes from commercial needs: from the days of the House of Worth to the most fashion weeks, the fashion show has always been the exhibition of a commodity.

The concept of the show has gradually become enriching and layering, becoming a real show and then leading, in the best cases, to performance art. But the greatest possible departure from the pure fashion show was made by Gucci with GucciFest: a week-long digital event that will be presented at 9:00 pm today, in which the brand’s SS21 collection will be narrated through seven short films gathered under the title of Overture Of Something That Never Ended and accompanied by fifteen additional side narratives that will be used to present the creations of as many young designers.

The first episode of Gucci’s Overture, called “At Home” will follow the protagonist, Silvia, intent on her morning routine in an apartment in Rome. The remaining episodes will see Silvia go to a bar, post office, theater, visit her neighbors, then a vintage shop and finally get lost in the streets of Rome surrounded by unusual and bizarre characters including Florence Welch, Billie Eilish and Harry Styes – all dressed in Gucci. So it’s going to be something like a classic Gucci video campaign full of stars on steroids.

Before and after each episode, the short films that will present the collections of Ahluwalia, Hillary Taymour, Rui Zhou, Gui Rosa, Bianca Saunders, Mowalola, Josephine Bergqvist and Livia Schück, Jezabelle Cormio, Stefan Cooke, Jordan Bowen and Luca Marchetto, Shanel Campbell, Boramy Viguier, Yueqi Qi, Gareth Wrighton and Charles de Vilmorin.

Each of these side videos will take advantage of a different concept and format, getting closer to video-art than pure cinema: mixtures of archival footage and abstractionism, 3D rendering, imaginary trailers of a video game, adaptations of a Byron poem, autobiography and horror of the 80s.

An ambitious cross-sectoral program – so ambitious indeed that it is difficult to predict its outcome: an incredibly artistic project could emerge that could turn into a platform for young creatives or a fashion advertising festival could come out. In fact, we remember that, although cinema with a capital “C” is much invoked, these videos have no other purpose than to sell luxury clothes.

We are at a crossroads: now advertising can transcend itself and become something more or turn out to be utter pandering. At the end of this week, at least, we will have understood that.