Valentino Haute Couture Digital Fall 2020. Digital show “Of Grace and Light”, the narrative, reinterpreted collection through a digital live performance, direct from Cinecittà Studios in Rome. Review by Eleonora de Gray, Editor-in-Chief of RUNWAY MAGAZINE.
The Live Performance will bring together the human and the digital touch creating a dialogue where neither of them will take the lead. No digital effects can substitute the humanitas. The result will be the expression of the inner values of Couture: creativity, imagination and emotion. Pierpaolo Piccioli dialogue with Nick Knight, founder of SHOWstudio, who supposedly proposes innovative and ground-breaking projects to the big fashion houses.
Although there’s something more to it than meet the eye…. Let’s refresh our fashion memory. Have we seen this somewhere before?.. Perhaps in French film “Peau d’âne” by Jacques Demy. No, it’s not that. Ah, yes, we’ve seen this presentation by Haute couture designer in France (also, as this collection presented as Haute Couture collection of Valentino) Franck Sorbier for Fall Winter 2012-2013 season. Frank Sorbier used 3D projection mapping technology to present his collection: a woman dressed in a large white dress acted as a projection screen for ephemeral patterns. The process was relayed on stage by an Ultrabook which controlled the animation on the dress.
FYI, 3D video mapping is a multimedia technology that makes it possible to project light or videos on volumes, to recreate large images on structures in relief such as buildings. It also makes it possible to recreate universes at 360 °. This technique makes possible to create optical illusions and to disturb the viewer’s perception or even to bring movement into the static dress.
So why would renown Nick Knight, SHOWstudio, La Mode en Images, Liberte Productions, proposed to Pierpaolo Piccioli, great creative director of Valentino, the presentation concept which was already used 8 years ago by another Haute Couture designer Franck Sorbier? Does this Nick Knight needs to pick up the ideas from others to be recognized as “the leading force behind this new medium, offering a unique platform to nurture and encourage fashion” (SHOWstudio About)?.. Checking briefly works of Nick Knight, SHOWstudio, picks from Jean-Paul Goude has been noted…. This is NOT poetic or innovative….
But let’s see the presentation first….. Indeed very beautiful…. Genius of Pierpaolo Piccioli has no boundaries.
