In 2020 I embarked on two collaborations as a writer with photographer Nick Knight, who created the fashion films S.W.A.L.K. and S.W.A.L.K. II for designer John Galliano and Maison Margiela for their 2020 Artisinal and Ready-to-Wear collections.
S.W.A.L.K.
Creative Direction: John Galliano
Directed by Nick Knight
Written by Kier-La Janisse
This fashion film cum documentary is the final denouement of John Galliano’s move to communicate the Maison Margiela A/W 20 couture collection digitally. Made in collaboration with SHOWstudio, a process documentary tinged with demonic presence intermingles with Knight’s signature image manipulation, creating an enigmatic video piece that brings in such disparate references as the 80s club scene Blitz Kids, the veiled marble statues of the 1800s, and mysterious happenings in the Margiela atelier.
See the film on the Showstudio website HERE >>
S.W.A.L.K. II
Creative Direction: John Galliano
Directed by Nick Knight
Written by Kier-La Janisse
‘For Margiela, the co-ed is an artistic industrialisation of the artisanal. We would like to show how the artisanal could influence the ready to wear, how it can inspire us and the industrialisation of fashion’ John Galliano
‘The details of that mad tango all came back, the stabbing intensity of the movement, fabric chafing into flesh’
John Galliano’s Maison Margiela S/S 21 co-ed collection is unveiled in S.W.A.L.K II, a film made by Nick Knight in collaboration with SHOWstudio. Intertwining with the distant memory of moonlit tango dancers in Buenos Aires and an impending marriage, documentary footage from inside the Margiela Atelier reveals the two lines of artisanal and ready-to-wear weaving together, renewed classics offer new iterations of genderless fashion. Transfixed in a continuous dance, whisperings of the past meet the present, sealed with a loving kiss.
See the film on the Showstudio website HERE>>