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Logan's Style Watch
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Fashion Advertising - Part II
by Logan Bentley Lessona
In my previous column about advertising in fashion I wondered just how effective the ads are if, as one presumes, they are conceived with the purpose of selling the product.
Benetton has for years used advertising to provoke and to promote an institutional image, that of a company very much concerned with social problems and the environment. For years Luciano Benetton had complete faith and trust in photographer/creator Oliviero Toscani, and supported his ideas even when they resulted in lively controversy.
Evidently the bottom line finally prevailed, or Benetton felt they had made their point, because after losing the profitable Sears account they returned to traditional ads this fall.
But if one company has given up controversy, others have not. Last season trendy maker of shoes Cesare Paciotti featured a well-lit model dressed in black (presumably a widow?) sitting in the middle of a graveyard at night. In one photo she holds a year-old infant wrapped in black. Her knees are pulled up, legs apart, showing her black panties. The ad sure captures your attention, but does it make you want to buy her reptile shoes?
According to Italy's "Panorama," New York magazine defined the ad as "In extremely bad taste." Paciotti's ad manager explained, "We wanted to show beautiful girls who marry old millionaires and are glad when the old man is gone. A little ironic game." (Shades of Anna Nicole Smith?) Paciotti says the ads were shot in a studio so as not to offend the dead.
Ungaro may have gone a bit far with a recent campaign involving an ultra-skinny blonde model (Christy Howell) and a white German Shepherd dog wearing a heavy black studded collar. Mario Sorrentini, one of the hottest fashion and advertising photographers on the scene, created the ambiguous photos. They show the model embracing the dog, the dog embracing the model, the dog licking her chicly shod feet as she opens her mouth in.... ecstasy?
An Ungaro spokesman defended the campaign saying: "I don't understand the protests of Harper's Bazaar readers for these images that are poetic and not vulgar, a modern version of Beauty and the Beast that reinterprets the ancient relationship of love and solidarity between man and dog."
Psychoanalyst Furio Ravera told Panorama "Anything that attracts attention and makes a company's message emerge from thousands of others works. In Ungaro's case, the non-verbal message (relationship between woman and animal) focuses attention on the scandal before the dress." Bazaar publisher Jeanette Chang adds, "Ungaro generated a lot of attention in the U.S. I love this attention, I love the phone calls from people who praise, insult, and express their opinion. That's what advertising is for, no?"
Shock isn't limited to the Europeans. What to make of the Perry Ellis ad shot in a dark-green tiled shower stall showing a model slumped against the wall staring blankly at the camera and a man's hand pulling at the belt of her gray and black tweed overcoat. Another model, wearing a simple black sleeveless dress, reclines on her back, behind her the bent hairy legs of a man who seems to be leaving. I can't say these ads turns me on, nor do I want to contemplate the meaning.
Humor: The late Franco Moschino was the master of irony. Fortunately his spirit lives on with the help of stylist Rosella Giardina. One two-page facing ad shows a brunette model on the left wearing a military-style overcoat with Kepi cap. Saluting the camera with her right hand, the left pulls up a black fishnet stocking on a thigh revealed by the opened coat and showing a pair of pink lace-frilled panties and cartridge belt holding pink lipsticks. The opposite page shows the following items attached to a board: a pretty nightgown in camouflage-printed chiffon, an olive drab backpack, pale pink strappy high-heeled sandals, a cartridge belt filled with pink lipsticks, and a pair of white panties with the stenciled inscription: "Love is War!"
I must admit I love the ad of handbag manufacturer Francesco Biasia that shows a pretty blonde beauty-contest winner sporting a ribbon inscribed "Miss Diet" juxtaposed with a photo of a pristine white handbag from which a partially unwrapped chocolate candy bar emerges. But then I have a weakness for chocolate. Grade: A+.
Clothing manufacturer Alberto Aspesi amuses with an ad by the Oliviero Toscani Studio. A cheerful black and white photo shows a street vendor holding a variety of fake Louis Vuitton, Prada, Dior, and Fendi handbags. Labels indicate he is from Mali, the various bags are false, and the only "real" item in the photo is a "Real Aspesi down jacket" that the literature student is wearing. I like it, I like it.
On to Prada, one of Italy's fashion stars. (Gucci's ads were described in the previous column.) In some fashion magazines Prada has used a heavy paper that conveys the metallic effect of some sporty outfits. I would say the Prada and Miu Miu (cheaper line) ads are pretty tame compared to others, but they do make you wonder. You see a very young man, almost adolescent, in a restaurant with a thin plain-faced model. His ostrich boots and her handbag are featured. Then you see him leading her by the arm from the restaurant, she with a Mona Lisa-like smile on her face. Then the couple is on the street with snow falling, she's wearing a chiffon dress with a pale yellow print and yellow leather pumps, and finally we see the hero, wearing a black ostrich coat, placing a tweed coat with a fur collar on her shoulders. And the snow still falls. Guess you have to be a Prada fan to get the message. I don't get it, but you can't argue with success!
© 2000 Logan Bentley Lessona
Syndicated by ParadigmTSA
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