Tuesday 3 January 2012

Dolce and Gabbana : The Italian Family Saga

I recently featured some of my favorite spring/summer 2012 ad campaigns from the ones that have been released so far.My favorite out of my favorites is the Dolce and Gabbana campaign ; both the womenswear and menswear campaigns are just plain wonderful.
Giampaolo Sgura was enlisted by Dolce and Gabbana to photograph Italian beauties-actress, Monica Bellucci and model, Bianca Balti in a touching, big family story for the womenswear campaign. Shot in in Southern Italy, the campaign was inspired by Italian beauty and its female cinema star icons like Sofia Loren, Monica Vitti and Anna Magnani.
The campaign is shot like a series of family photographs, complete with children and grandparents. Its the nicest thing. The concept is just very homey, comforting , generously doused with that Southern Italy charm, you know? you can almost smell the mozzarella and the olive oil, hear the old Italian ballads,and see the dancing .Very small-town, very romantic.
My favorite picture is the one outside the house at the gate. Such a proud family photograph. It's strangely reminiscent  of a time when people actually used to get all dressed up for a photograph, when photographers were specially commissioned, and the day was an occasion, rather than the present day-when every house has a budding photographer with an expensive SLR, and getting your picture take is so blah.
The styling is what brings out the characters of each member of the family, and you can really tell. Monica Bellucci (yes!), looks like the temptress that she is, but you can tell there is some story around her.Her  seductive expressions, the makeup, the black wardrobe (widow?), its all very intriguing. Then there is Bianca Balti, her wardrobe is the only source of color in each of the pictures. One must commend the photographer, Giampaolo Sgura for photographing the campaign and the models in a way that there is a lot of interest surrounding the story of this Italian family we have been introduced to, yet it doesn't overpower the clothes themselves. In fact, everything works beautifully.Often, when a star is  involved, the campaign is pretty much centered around them (LV's many campaigns), and the concept of the campaign becomes the star itself. In this campaign the actress, along with the models is just a character that propels the story forwards.Of course, Bellucci's magnetism adds to the campaign, the character and the story- no two ways about that,but she doesn't steal the thunder.The clothes, the concept, the locales, the models contribute equally to the campaign. The campaign doesn't rely solely on any one element. I like that. I like that if you took even one element away, the outcome would've been completely different.I like that everything seems indispensable.





Photographed by Mariano Vivanco, the Men’s campaign features real actors of Italian Cinema.: Giuseppe Fiorello, Francesco Scianna, Filippo Nigro, Thomas Trabacchi, Primo Reggiani and Chiara Francini.
Again, theme of the Italian family is repeated. Its really beautiful how the label has stuck to the same theme, but given both the line such different treatments. Two interpretations of the same theme, by two different photographers. Gorgeous.




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