The Ghost of Balenciaga

<![CDATA[<p style="text-align:auto"></p><figure><img src="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/84c03e_e04cc1a845e547268b8f0baed6cc4018~mv2.jpeg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_667,al_c,q_80/file.png" width="1000" height="667" title="Image"></figure><p style="text-align:auto">You’ve probably heard from friends or seen online about the Balenciaga scandals that occurred in November of last year. There has been a lot of talk since then by major magazine companies about it explaining what happened. So if you have been wanting a brief overview of what happened and how is it being handled then you came to the right place.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">There are two scandals of ad campaigns that are going around which are the GiftShop campaign and the Garde-Robe Campaign according to New York Times Magazine.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto"><strong>Garde-Robe Campaign</strong></p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">According to New York Times magazine, it states that <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/28/style/balenciaga-campaign-controversy.html" target="_blank">“The Garde-Robe campaign — which included Nicole Kidman, Isabelle Huppert, and Bella Hadid as models — was shot in July, months before the Gift Shop campaign, and took place in an office setting.” </a>The Gift shop scandal happened on November 16th.</p><p style="text-align:auto">This campaign was the first came that happened out of the two of them but it is not their first time being at the center of controversy since Demna Gvasilia has been their artistic director since 2015 according to 2015. They’ve had a couple of other campaigns that were questionable. This is a $25 million lawsuit initiation, and according to Yahoo, it states that <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/now/timeline-balenciagas-ad-campaign-scandal-230711451.html" target="_blank">“featuring an “office” theme (not shot by Galimberti), which included a photo with a page from a Supreme Court ruling of United States v. Williams in the background. That ruling deemed the promotion of child pornography illegal and not protected under freedom of speech.”</a></p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">After all the backlash, Balenciaga issued its first statement on November, 24th of last year where they apologized for the campaign and removed the campaign from all platforms. One day later, Balenciaga initiates the lawsuit against North Six and Nicholas Des Jardins who is the Garde-Robe set designer. Then about a week later, Demna responds to all of this by apologizing on Instagram.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">According to New York Times Magazine, it states that “But all were supposed to be “fake office documents,” Balenciaga said in its Nov. 28 statement:<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/28/style/balenciaga-campaign-controversy.html" target="_blank"> “They turned out to be real legal papers most likely coming from the filming of a television drama</a>.” So the documents being real were the result of reckless negligence of the people who were in charge of the shoot since none of Balenciaga's representatives were there to monitor things like this from happening. But they took full accountability for this according to the statement that they put out.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto"><strong>Gift Shop Campaign</strong></p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">The next campaign scandal that occurred was the gift shop campaign which happened on November 16th. According to the independent.co, it states that <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/fashion/balenciaga-child-teddy-bear-scotus-kim-kardashian-b2235833.html" target="_blank">“The campaign was shot earlier this month to promote the brand’s collection of holiday gifts, including champagne glasses, pillows, studded dog bowls, and teddy bear handbags.”</a> After the campaign got out, they received a lot of backlash about two weeks later from public figures and celebrities even Kim Kardashian when people on social media noticed the picture with plush toys dressed in bondage and BDSM gear.</p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">After the backlash, Galimberti issued his own statement on Instagram about the campaign saying that “was falsely associated with my photos.”, according to the Independent. co. Lots of people brought attention to this campaign accusing them of sexualizing children and normalizing child pornography.</p><p style="text-align:auto">Balenciaga isn’t suing the photographer because as stated in New York Times that<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/28/style/balenciaga-campaign-controversy.html" target="_blank"> “No. Mr. Galimberti had nothing to do with the Garde-Robe campaign. He also did not make the decision to feature children with the bear bags in the Gift Shop campaign. He said that Balenciaga had told him the theme of the shoot was “punk.”</a></p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto"><strong>What happened next</strong></p><p style="text-align:auto"></p><p style="text-align:auto">With the first scandal, it states in New York Times Magazine that<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/28/style/balenciaga-campaign-controversy.html" target="_blank"> “The long-term repercussions remain to be seen, but already, the trade publication Business of Fashion on Nov. 28 revoked an award it had planned to give to Demna, saying it held “the safety of children in the highest regard.”</a> So even though we don’t know everything that happened behind the scenes with this scandal, there were some repercussions, though the proper level of repercussions in contrast to the impact are debatable.</p>]]>