A.I. and Vogue Italia: Leading the Way in the Evolution of Fashion Representation | PhotoVogue Festival 2023: What Makes Us Human? Image in the Age of A.I.

[audience clapping]

And we should also have Juan, there he is.

Can we have Juan in the back here

like Woody Allen s mom on

yeah, there he is.

Okay, so I guess that s yours.

[Carlijn] Oh, I have another one here.

[Alessia] So why do I have all this microphones?

[Carlijn] Hello?

This one is working.

[Alessia] That s okay.

Maybe, yeah.

Okay so welcome, Juan, and this is so

I feel like you look huge.

[Alessia laughing]

I look giant.

Yeah.

[Juan laughing]

Well, let s send Juan a picture to show him

how, you know, how everyone is like

he s like this big presence here on stage.

So first of all, I wanna say Juan

is the Creative Director of all editions of Vogue.

So it s incredible to have him with us

to share his knowledge and experience.

Well, Francesca Ragazzi doesn t need an introduction,

especially here in Italy, she s the Editor in Chief,

Head of Content, how you wanna call it,

of Vogue Italia.

And Carlijn is an incredible, incredible, incredible

photographer, talented, and I had the pleasure

to be with her recently in Amsterdam at Foam,

where for a monographic, an exhibition

that was really splendid and I ve never seen

so many people lining up so nicely

for like kilometers to get in and see the exhibition.

So, congratulations also on that.

[Carlijn] Thank you, thank you.

You know I think I m super happy

to be here with all of you, because I feel also

it s a bit of a family reunion

to talk about things among friends.

But, the world is gonna listen because

we are recording it and putting it online,

so just to put some pressure.

And

[Alessia laughing]

my first question for all of you would

I would like to know, when did you first hear

about Generative A.I. to creative images?

This is just to understanding exactly.

Maybe wanna start with you, Juan?

Um,

I guess in the movies, right?

[Juan laughing]

I guess in like Matrix and A.I. and all this Sci-Fi,

I started getting interested in that,

and you know how in Sci-Fi movies sometimes

they re like anticipation of what s to come.

But then it started, I guess that we

really tangible, we started hearing it in the news

like, what, two years ago or something like that?

That we started seeing on the internet

all these generative images being filtered

and all these people experimenting with this

crazy images, and dismembered body parts,

and all this things.

And I don t know, that felt very interesting.

Yeah.

[Alessia] Thank you, Juan, and what about you two?

I go?

No, I remember I got very impressed by someone during COVID

telling me why we are on Zoom everyday,

we are building up an AI world.

So the fact that is now coming, all of us have been,

but it has been a process and now it s tangible

and it s out there and people are starting

going into nuances.

But it is with us since much more time than we thought.

So maybe during COVID was the very first time

I realized the impact.

Yeah, I think like two years ago

it came accessible for everybody, and I think

that s when the change kind of happened.

Like all those special effects and 3D or CGI

or all those things were already there for movies,

but like to have it accessible for the public,

I think that s when the change happened.

Yeah, I agree it s always like that.

And then, well we re here together also because

you are the protagonists of this beautiful story

that we also have in the exhibition

for Vogue Italia with Bella.

[Francesca] Bella and Carlijn.

Exactly.

The issue.

And I wanted to ask all of you,

and you decided who wants to go first,

who had this idea and then how did this idea

came to life and, I know the struggles,

I think it s nice for people to know.

Even because let s say then when you guys did this,

it was already, if we think about it,

how fast everything goes, it s already the past.

It s like now it will be completely different,

and it s just a few months, no?

That s so scary, so-

Yeah, I mean time goes fast anyway.

Well I remember that like the stylist in Russia,

also my partner, he was talking about A.I. a lot

and then at one point we were hanging out with Juan

and then we were talking about A.I. and then,

I don t know where the idea came from,

it was Imruh or Juan, and then I remember I was also

a little bit scared in the beginning,

because it was also new for me,

but it was super interesting.

But I remember, yeah, I remember that it was not

also so easy to do this, and it was a fun idea

but like the process was quite intense.

Yeah, one of the things, you know,

I think it was sometime last year that

all of these images, as I was saying before,

they really started appearing on the internet.

And obviously as those images appeared,

like there has been so much conversation, you know.

Every time there s a new technology,

every time there s a new something that breaks through,

these things get completely polarized very fast.

You know, the moment that a Generative A.I. images

come in, people start talking about the death

of photography, and this and that.

And I think that we all love talking in kind of those terms

and the conversation about photography

when those images were coming in were so interesting,

all the things that we were listening.

And that s where we were like,

Just, let s go, let s try to do a A.I. cover.

And it somehow felt very naughty,

I remember sitting with my team like discussing,

Should we actually do this?

Is this actually something that we should do?

It felt a little bit forbidden that we should

try to explore it, but then thank God,

Carlijn was super on board with this and, yeah.

It was a great, great experience.

Obviously full of complications in the process

because it s something very new to all of us, really.

Yeah, and from an editorial perspective,

I remember very well when Juan, Carlijn, and Imruh

came up like considered Vogue Italia the right platform

for having this conversation, since in the legacy

of the magazine it s always been about

being groundbreaking and experimenting

and going into the zeitgeist of the conversation.

And I remember from a corporate perspective,

that Condé Nast during those moments

was putting very strict guidelines around A.I.

because other edition of Vogue already tried

to do A.I. covers, very straightforward,

like just A.I. images on a cover.

So we really wanted to bring a step forward

and do a mix of human element, because

Bella Hadid, who is the cover star of the story

and the protagonist, is really Bella Hadid.

Was shot in studio with the entire creative team present.

And it s just about the background,

so from an editorial perspective I remember

it was very important to go into this new experiment

of mixing the A.I.

And I m glad you re bringing this up,

because I also wanna say that Condé Nast is taking

in a very responsible way, you know, a stance

towards A.I. and generated images in general.

We re not championing in it.

All that you see in the exhibition is there

because this festival is about A.I.,

so it would be like, what, stupid not to show A.I.

But we have very strict rules,

and we go with what s happening,

it s not that maybe these rules are not going to change,

but we try to be more ethical and responsible as possible

with the use of A.I.

With this said, I do believe that it s also good,

from my personal point of view, to experiment

always in an ethical way and see, you know,

what s out there, what are the new possibilities.

Because I don t know how you guys feel,

but I ve been saying this a lot in the past days,

I think there is a huge difference

between photography as a document, so photography

that needs to adhere to reality, to truth,

and then fashion and art, where who cares if?

You know, why do we need to be real?

I mean, you know, I remember David LaChapelle

once said, If you want reality, take the bus.

Which I sort of agree with, you know,

it s like we are giving people a dream,

we are giving people a way to now vision

and imagining and I wouldn t like to limit that, no?

[Carlijn] Yeah.

Absolutely, and also I think that, Alessia,

we are a magazine, right?

We are editorial, and it s really about that,

we are a fashion magazine at Vogue

and if you don t jump on the experimentation,

if you don t take risks, not only on A.I.,

but really on every story, then what s the point, right?

That s the whole point of the magazine

is to react to culture and try to keep up

with what s happening.

Sure, and Francesca, what is for you Vogue Italia?

And like bringing Vogue Italia to the future,

what is your vision for it and how does it

all come together with technology and digital print?

Well, first of all, make it more and more

like I think there is no story to tell without an audience.

And in today, fast pacing, challenging, changing

world of news and how we consume our content

I think there will be no future without

diversifying our channels of being seen.

So I think the magazine needs to become

more and more as a special project, like a book,

like a couture, like we always said with Juan,

with Anna, print is like couture for fashion.

But then on the meantime, considering our digital asset,

social media, the website, the live events like this one,

at the same level.

So not being less important than the print object.

So trying to join a bigger, bigger audience,

keeping the dream and keeping the aspirational

spending that Vogue is, but making it also

very comprehensible for the audience.

That s why I m very proud of this story,

because I don t know if you read the interview that we did,

the conversation between Carlijn and Imruh,

the A.I. artist that we re gonna talk about

and our writer, Michele Fossi, because he really goes into

deep in analyzing and explaining the images.

So I like when the images,

that is our most powerful language,

also goes with a sense, so.

Yeah, I agree, and I have to say

maybe not everyone here know, I mean I m sure

they re all your fan, but maybe not everyone know

that I think Carlijn was absolutely

the right people to do this with,

because you know she s been at the forefront

of everything that has to do with technology.

Maybe not all of you, you were a coder, right?

You started as a coder when you were like a teenager, no?

And everything that you do with technologies,

it s so cool, you re so aware of technologies.

So I think that was the best choice

that you guys could make, and I know because I ve seen

at the Foam exhibition, that there are some,

I mean there s your regular work,

and then there s some A.I. work,

which is already an evolution

of what we re seeing in Vogue Italia.

Maybe you can explain to us as you understood

maybe even more that you needed to be the person

in total control with the dialogue, with the machine,

and not to have that, no?

Yeah, I mean it s a very interesting program,

because it s also a kind of like travel through your brain

and what s in there and how it comes out.

So, I remember when we were doing that story

and it was also the first time I was,

I mean I practiced, but I needed higher resolution

and we needed all this technical things for the story.

So I had a really great artist on board, Chad,

and he helped me through the process,

making it high resolution, helping me

and finding all different prompts.

But I realized this whole program is not possible

to do it, like it s really your brain.

So everything that comes out is the words you put in.

And the more specialized you get,

the more you can create your own kind of world.

And it s really hard to have

somebody else doing that for you.

So that s also an interesting conversation,

like is it gonna steal your job?

Can somebody else make your work?

I m not sure if that s the case.

But I did that story for Vogue Italia,

which was really a super interesting learning process

and a good-

[Alessia] Well I think,

sorry I don t want to interrupt you,

but I think that Imruh, we say hi to Imruh

because I m sure it s gonna be sent to this.

Hi, Imruh.

I think he says something very, very interesting

in the interview, because it s not a given

that if you re a visual artist, you re so good with words.

Cause otherwise maybe you d be a writer, right?

So this is interesting, how somehow

to best work with A.I. you have to be able

to translate your vision into words, and-

[Carlijn] It s not given, exactly.

No.

And I think there is something even before that,

I think there is a words component,

but I also think there s an idea component.

You know, one of my biggest kind of things about A.I.

is that if you think about it, maybe 20 years ago

or 15 years ago when the internet started,

I think there s a lot of wave of photographers

that started basing their work

on looking at other images, right?

You know, the whole Tumblr thing, the whole kind of

doing mood boards and all this things.

And others people works becomes an inspiration,

became an inspiration for a lot of photographers.

In that sense, photographer, you can see

sometimes there s someone that comes in with like

a very strong vision, and then there s so many people

that follow, right?

And then you start kind of seeing how that vision

starts being replicated across different mediums

with different photographers, of obviously different markets

and this and that.

But A.I., I think that disrupts that so much

in a very good way, because I feel that

ultimately A.I. is like what it is

it s really a white canvas, right?

It s like just there s a blank piece of paper,

just tell me what you wanna see and I ll do it for you,

but just you need to come up

with your idea yourself, you know?

And I love that thing that A.I. unlocks

in the creative process of really thinking about ideas,

thinking about what you wanna say,

I think that articulating it in words is a technicality

at the end of the day.

But if you have a very clear idea what you wanna see,

the sky s the limit, and that s something very exciting

about A.I. I think.

Yeah, and connecting to Juan, words,

the fact that we choose the headline as being

Beyond Your Wildest Dream is very accurate,

because it push artist and creatives and everybody, I think,

all the chain of people on set included in the process

to really push the fantasy and your imagination.

And that s also the core of what we do at Vogue,

so it s true, without idea there cannot be

generating anything.

And A.I. really puts you in face of that

in a very clear way.

Then I remember Imruh or Chad or you were saying

that in this process, you need a poet,

you need a visual person, you need a A.I. whisperer,

someone who can use the right keywords

to connect with the machine.

So you need even many, many people.

Yeah, I think not only that, I think another point

that Imruh was making that I think is super on point,

is that you need to know your references.

So at the end, is like again it goes back to

what do you know, what have you studied,

what is your visual literacy, you know?

Because otherwise what you re gonna talk about

with the machine?

And you still need a visual eye,

because you can put in those references,

but if you pick kind of the wrong one

and, you know, like you still need a visual eye.

So it s really interesting that it s indeed a blank canvas

and it can give you so many routes,

but are you kind of picking the right one?

So it still kind of, you can still be your own artist

in this A.I. world.

It s interesting because I think, I don t know,

is it maybe 40 years ago when retouch started happening?

I don t know how many years ago,

but it s also like making everything more beautiful.

Everything you see is not real, everything is retouched,

and I feel this is just probably a different step

in the future that s gonna happen

and something that you also have to embrace, perhaps,

instead of fighting against it.

But what I think the other very interesting

and very nice thing that you said in the interview

is about that at the end, you still believe

that vision and the artist, this is not something

that is damaging for the artist, not at all.

And you say something that is very positive,

is about, you know, you either embrace it

and make it yours, or you know, you passively

think that this thing is gonna destroy you.

Which is, you know-

But I think there are also different ways.

Like I also use my own pictures with A.I.,

if I use A.I.

But when I use A.I. I use my own pictures

and then it still kind of becomes your own thing.

Because even the programs, they are searching for pixels

that are based on the pixels you put in the machine.

So then it s interesting how you can

get your own image into a different image,

but still with the roots of your own image.

And I mean this is are so many interesting

places we could go with this conversation really.

Francesca, and exactly what do you see

how do you see also for the work that we do

in magazine, the integration of A.I.?

I just, it might be even more of a collaborative approach

somehow, and I feel that what you brought to Italia

compared to what it was before, it s more collaboration.

So and really I have to say it s a big change

since I ve been working in this here for like 30 more years

and I do feel that we all are working

in a more collaborative way, which brings me again

to the beautiful projects you re doing,

also with other editions of Vogue, to the fact that Juan

is somehow connected to all different editions of Vogue.

So again, how can we, and you, your partnership with Imruh

and using, so this togetherness and connectedness,

how do you keep your individuality and also?

The togetherness.

[Francesca laughing]

No, I think it s about having a very clear point of view,

I think we started speaking,

okay, one very important thing about this project to know

is that we have been talking about it

for one year before.

[Francesca laughing]

[Carlijn] Yeah, we were really early, but you know

we had a top model.

Exactly, before executing it.

And that really comes to the point

that you need to have a point of view about a topic.

Like you can treat A.I. in 300 ways,

as all the amazing exhibitions here at BASE shows.

So you can really take a point of view

that can be right for you or wrong,

but so what I m proud of is that this was a way

to work with A.I.

And this is the Vogue Italia point of view for A.I.,

that doesn t necessarily means another edition

can do it in another way.

And that s why it s interesting to sit at a global table,

as we do, because it s more challenging

to bring your local voice to a global table

and you need to have even more personality.

I always say, if you sit in a table with just Italian

it s easier to, you know, show off let s say.

If you sit with the world, you need to,

and the most amazing thing about Vogue these days

is really democratic and only based on ideas,

then of course we all know, I see many creatives

in the room, we need a budget, okay.

But first of all the idea, Juan, I see your eyes.

[Francesca laughing]

And the fact that, for example,

one of our franchising edition, Vogue Philippines,

did an amazing story with the more than 100 years

tattoo maker in the middle of nowhere in the Philippines.

That woman was found, was brought to a cover,

and the cover made the tour of the world.

That s what s strong, that s a good idea

can come from every territory, it s not like about

like in the past, then maybe a few countries

were leading more than others.

You can still lead them, but only if your idea is good.

So I can t wait to see more Vogue edition

challenging A.I. in a new way.

Yeah, I think what was, and indeed, what you were saying

what was interesting is that there is still a photo

and I think otherwise for me it would have also been

less interesting.

Because also we were doing it way back,

and hands were not refined with the program,

faces are not refined, and we really did the photos

and we used A.I. as a tool to enhance the photo.

And in this way it s very much is what Vogue is doing,

it s just like showing a transformation,

showing the dream basically.

But I think for the audience it s interesting

to tell a few stories about the background, for example,

the cover was supposed to be a gymnastic in a pool.

Yeah.

[Francesca laughing]

So basically we shot many looks in a studio,

and we tried, I had every idea already thought of,

every idea was already ready to go.

But when we were shooting, we shot her,

because it was supposed to be in a pool, a acrobatic pool.

So we had her hanging on the rings.

[Francesca laughing]

All these crazy ideas, but we also did some safe options,

thank God.

And in the end when I started playing with the A.I.,

I was like, Oh this is not really working.

Because like you work with, like when you have to combine

the photo with the A.I. it s like the lights, the colors,

it s a lot of work to combine it.

Like doing A.I. by itself is easy,

but combining it with a photo, it takes a lot of retouch,

grading, so many tryouts.

So this cover was not meant to be the cover,

but in the end I really like it.

The colors blend really well together.

I also, sorry, you also said that it took you

much more time than doing a normal shoot.

Was still a set designer, and how was

Bella Hadid reaction, Juan?

How did she feel?

Because that s also interesting.

She was very, I mean I wasn t on set unfortunately

for that one, but I know that we spend a lot of time

chasing her, cause I think we all collectively felt

that she was the only person who could do this story right.

And she was very grateful about us waiting for her

to do that story, because she was feeling

as excited as we were about the topic.

Yeah, she was super into it, and she s this model

who loves to experiment and who loves to transform

and she s not afraid, and then in the morning

I asked her like, Is there one scenario

that you really dream of that s not possible?

Or something.

And then she was like, I wanna be a butterfly.

There s one picture with a butterfly.

[Carlijn laughing]

[Alessia] Listen, and-

[Carlijn] That s her input.

Did the machine ever surprised you?

[Carlijn] Yeah, it was not so easy.

No but surprised like, that you didn t expect that

so maybe you change around, like you liked actually

what the machine-

Well we did this story with DALL-E

and not the Midjourney.

And I think Midjourney gives you a lot

of creative input, while DALL-E really

just gives you what you basically

like what you prompt, yeah, what you ask.

So it didn t really give me things that I didn t expect.

But it s, I mean, there was one with,

one photo with a lot of pottery.

[page crinkling]

Yeah, this one.

And all the different ceramic potteries were so crazy,

at one point it became statues,

so that was interesting, yeah.

[Carlijn laughing]

But like for instance, there s the dress

that it s made of, it s like a computer, right?

And you were saying that-

[Carlijn] Yeah-

Actually what happened is the DALL-E, no?

It made the backdrop with the.

So the top is really a keyboard, it s a-

[Francesca] It s a JW.

JW.

[Carlijn laughing]

[Alessia] Yeah, yeah.

And then you see all the cables,

so there you can see how it gets input from the dress

and like creates something else.

[Alessia] So somehow it did surprise.

Yeah, exactly, yeah.

Cause it s like, why would you do that?

You know, it s interesting, this idea also

cause I m trying to think back in the days

of the importance of the mistake in photography, right?

How so many incredible discoveries in photography

and pictures are the results of mistakes.

Like with Blumenfeld, with Man Ray, with a lot of

experimentation comes like that.

So I am thinking there is a big space for mistakes

at the moment with this technology

that could be interesting, no?

Yeah, and I think it s also interesting

that we experiment on the time when it starts

and then after 50 years you look back and you re like,

Wow that looks awful.

Probably you re gonna think that looks so amateuristic,

but it s also the time where we in, so that s interesting.

Yeah, I think it s gonna be less than 50 year,

because if I think the speed at which everything goes now,

exactly, when you did that, and I can see it

there s also Charlie Engman s

picture here in the exhibition,

you see like when he started the hands were all,

now the hands are perfect.

It s just who knows in six months what s gonna happen?

I wanted to go back to that Vogue Philippines cover

you were talking about, that I adored, I totally adored.

This has nothing to do with what we re talking about now,

but it s a question anyway.

I was also asking myself, how come that every time

we do something like this on a cover,

which at the end a cover is very political,

it s like you know it s a statement.

I think about also the beautiful Rossellini cover

that you just published.

Everyone is in awe, everyone is like,

Ah, finally, we see a real woman with the wrinkles.

Which, I totally agree, in fact I don t do anything

to myself and you know it s like, you take so long

to get the wrinkles, why would you wanna take them out?

It s like it takes so long, I don t see the point.

But the idea is, how come that then there is

this obsession, isn t it weird?

It s like on one side, I would love to also

ask the audience this, on one side we re all

like eager and we just wait to see finally

something real, something, a face that is a face

with their sign, the age.

And then they all get plastic surgery, what s that?

Yeah, let me take on that one.

Because I think that, you know, to me fashion

kind of operates in something of an echo chamber, right?

Like I think, to Francesca s point about audiences,

you cannot have storytelling

if you don t have the audience, right?

I think that sometimes fashion forgets

that there s an audience.

And it s a lot about behind the scenes conversations

and the references and the models and the beauty standards

and all these things, and it becomes quite a close circle.

When you think about it, the Vogue Philippines cover,

and other covers and other magazines that are around,

and they create such a big success

that at the end of the day they re very, very simple ideas,

it s just that people are daring to

break from that echo chamber that I think

creates such a loop of repetition, and yeah.

It standardizes everything, in a way.

Thanks, Juan.

Francie, Carlijn, what is your opinion on that?

Well, I think like, are you talking about

the recent Vogue cover?

No I m talking about the fact,

I m not asking you what you think about the cover,

but mostly how can that in this society that we live in,

there is this dichotomy completely

between we re all happy that finally we see

a real woman on a cover that didn t do plastic surgery,

but then everyone does plastic surgery.

So, I don t know.

[Carlijn] Yeah, it s-

It s just something missing.

It s a very strange world, I find it really weird

that young girls go on TikTok and they have

all these filters and they see basically

what they can do with their face to make it look better.

Because they think it looks better,

well that s a whole different topic.

But I think it s a breath for people

when they see a real woman, but maybe it s not

the younger public that thinks that,

so maybe that s a different audience.

Do you feel a responsibility, Francesca,

in this sense being leading a magazine like Vogue Italia

and you know, leading also back there for representation

and everything?

First of all, I think we are in a era

where everything is more and more polarized,

and this will be even more with the geopolitical situation,

so I think the next year we will see

more and more this dichotomy you are saying.

But I also think Vogue needs to lead the conversation

in the sense of sometimes bringing up topics

that are maybe not trendy at the moment.

For example, Isabella always spoke about wrinkles,

but it was awhile that she hasn t done so.

So bringing back again the topic at the very right moment

after, for example, all the conversations

around the super models cover.

I mean, it was the right time to bring back

that topic with her.

So sometimes it s also about timing,

when you need an image to be out there

to tell something to the world.

It doesn t have to be something

that was never telled before.

Because, really, Isabella made this statement

already for 30 years, for example.

So I think even I see with the younger audience

they get excited when they see image

that they re not familiar with, and that maybe

because they live in a world where you have filters

and so many retouch images, to see once in awhile

an image with wrinkle, creates an excitement.

Because it s a-

Well I think it s important that we keep doing this-

[Francesca] Well we need to, of course, we need to-

Absolutely, so I can keep all my-

[Francesca laughing]

[Francesca] Wrinkles.

Wrinkles without a problem.

No but apart from that, we just have 15 minutes

and I wanna leave space for the people to,

I just one more question, you guys,

think if you have a question the time to do it

is now or never.

So, Carlijn, you being a beautiful young woman,

brilliant creator, what are fashion magazines for you today?

How do you feel about fashion magazines?

Well thank you.

Fashion magazines, well fashion magazines gave, I think

because when I started as a photographer

I was always doing really my own thing

and like my own kind of world, and I think

the fashion magazines are kind of giving me

that platform to experiment and to create images

with great models, with great clothing, with great teams.

So for me, it s important to push myself

and to create new things, it s really for me,

it s creativity.

And I think print is still a very important thing

for artists, for models, for audience.

Like it s I think, yeah, I hope it will stay forever.

Thank you.

While we wait, that s a bit of a question

I have for everyone, cause exactly I wanted to ask you-

No, just one thing, it s interesting how also

we see a conversation going forward

that Bella only had the cover with Vogue Italia

before and it was by Meisel,

and I know she was very proud of that cover.

And the fact that very organically,

the second cover was by a female photographer

with such a strong project, I think it also shows

that we are evolving.

Well, things are finally have changed

from that point of view.

Don t be scared, you can do your questions.

[microphone feedback]

So anyway, also I wanna ask you, Francesca,

when you were younger, when you were a teenager

and you would look at fashion magazines,

what were you looking for?

Like because for me, it s always been the photography.

Like it s always been, I remember that I would buy

Vogue Italia and I would love the pictures

and the stories, so it was really the photography

that attracted me, more than the fashion.

I mean the fashion for me was

a part of making a great image.

So I wanted to ask you.

Yeah, I think for me it was always been

the storytelling, because I like when the fashion

helps telling the story.

And it s true that it s not just the dress in itself,

but it needs to be cinematic in a way,

that tells a story, and that s why Vogue Italia s

always been so, this tension between the story

and the image itself was always there.

That makes the dream of it, Juan?

[Francesca laughing]

You?

Um,

to me it was also the images,

but it was also the ads, I was very drawn into the ads

when I was a kid looking at fashion magazines.

I m from Argentina, and maybe we weren t

exposed to these campaigns in the street

as you are in Europe, so opening up

a foreign fashion magazine was like, Oh.

All these images.

Yeah, I ve been mainly visual driven.

The ads were so creative.

Like they had, there was a, I don t know in the 90s

I think that advertisement was really incredible, no?

It was fearless, wasn t it?

I think it was complete fearless.

[Alessia] Yeah, yeah.

I think that today there s so many parameters

around the messages that we send to our audiences,

but you look back and you were like,

How on Earth did they get away with these things?

You have no idea.

Oh no imagine testing on Gucci now.

[Carlijn] Yeah.

I mean, no one could do it, no one.

Anyway, we really have just 10 minutes

so I wanna leave space to you, and you have a chance,

okay, I see a question here.

Microphone, first row.

[Audience Member] Hello, hi.

My question is for you, Carlijn, about, you know

[microphone feedback]

about the energy on set, the emotional energetic aspect

of creating that environment with Bella,

with the crew for the cover of Vogue Italia.

Because of course, there s always a sense of

intentionality with the world-building and being like,

Okay, we re gonna imagine X, Y, and Z.

What was it like, did you have to use a different approach,

did you find yourself calling in

a different type of process to be like,

Okay, we re shooting it this way and later on we re gonna

fill in, you know, this environment and we re gonna

build you up to be this way.

Did you find yourself using a different approach

just to create the more emotional aspect

of the character and the world and that?

Yeah, I mean we were trying to have

every image very different, because everything is possible.

Like the title s Beyond Your Wildest Dreams.

So every image is different from each image,

like in one image she s a keyboard in an office,

and the other image she s in Egypt.

So yeah, it s very, how can you say that,

like pragmatic?

It s like a different way, it s not like,

Oh wow this works beautiful, let s go into this.

No it s really like, We re gonna do this

so then we re gonna do that.

So that changes the vibe.

But she s a lot of fun, and the whole team knows each other,

so we were just like, I was telling her,

This is the plan, let s try more things.

And keeping everything very open

in case things are not working.

But every moment that we were doing one photo,

I was telling, So this is gonna be there

you re gonna be there, this is the mood.

So she would do into that world,

and she could actually be an actress,

I think she did a movie.

But like she really dives into that world,

so that s amazing.

She s really the one who can give that energy to you, yeah.

[Francesca] It s interesting because there were not set

built up there, so for the team-

[Carlijn] Yeah, it s visualizing.

[Francesca] Engaged there is more.

It s a great question, I think.

[Alessia] Other questions, yes, please.

[Audience Member 2] Hi, first of all, thank you so much.

And my question is, we talked about reality,

augmented reality, and I find it really interesting

how we talked about wrinkles, real people,

how it s really interesting for the audience,

and also how augmented reality

is really interesting for the audience, Vogue as well,

which is becoming our reality also.

So I wanted to ask the balance, your opinions,

because Vogue s identity, now we see

all of these combined.

And I wanted to ask you, what is the future

of your opinions on these subjects?

[Francesca] Juan, you wanna reply, or I go?

Whatever.

What s the future, you know,

once again with the beginning of the internet

there was such a polarization again like,

Oh magazines are dead, and everything s gonna be digital.

And this and that, and the more and more we do this

the more that we realize that, you know,

the road to success for us, editorially speaking

and to tell the stories that we wanna tell,

it s just really kind of connect all of the things

that surround us, whether it s the print,

whether it s the website, whether it s augmented reality,

whether it s something else that s coming in the future,

et cetera, et cetera.

To us it s really about creating ecosystems

in which we can use all of these elements

to tell the stories, really.

I feel that keeping ourselves open

to all of these technologies and keeping the curiosity going

kind of also pushes culture forward,

which is also the roll of a magazine.

And yeah, I don t know if that answers this question.

Yeah, no I think you know our goal

is to create, influence, and to engage with people

that wants to have an opinion and wants to think

about a conversation that we are raising up,

and trying with us to find their point of view.

So for example, one of Juan ideas for next season

is around longevity, because it is a fact

that in a world where, you know,

people care about their identity, their visual identity,

but in the meantime they wanna be natural,

but in the meantime they use A.I.

So maybe, for example, this topic can combine both things.

So it s interesting to keep asking also ourself

the right question and try to battle what s the

curiosity of people, and engage a conversation.

We wanna be loud, but we want our audience

to be louder than us and engage with us

and give us their point of view.

So it s very fascinating when you have an audience

that wants to participate, they don t wanna see.

You know, we all are creator today,

we can participate to-

Also, I would suggest to think of everything

as something liquid.

There is nothing that is always the same, you know?

And this is beyond philosophy, but it s true,

everything changes, everything modifizes,

even our physicality doesn t end.

I mean it now ends where the technology brings us,

and the same is for a magazine.

It evolves, you know, it s not anymore just in print,

what does it mean when you re not just in print?

It means your audience is much bigger,

it means that people that wouldn t even before

buy the magazine are going to see what you re doing,

because, you know, so you are even a larger responsibility.

I feel it would be a mistake, it would be wrong,

to think that people should always,

people and things and should always be the same

and nothing changes.

No.

Everything fluctuates and changes and grows,

and this is something that enriches all of us.

You know to always try to think something new,

and, you know, we have new challenges everyday

and how do we speak to everyone?

I think that s-

And even like only trying,

you can ask yourself the question,

I think is very intelligent from

a great, incredible creative like Carlijn,

to ask herself, Does this A.I. will steal my job?

Like it s good to ask yourself,

because you need to see if it s really something

that s gonna happen.

Exactly, and that s why it s also interesting

to kind of embrace it and just try it out,

so then you kind of realize, Well, I think it won t.

I won t because it was such a struggle,

and it requires so many people,

and I had to control my vision even more

because it s about creation.

That showed that makes you even more human

coming to the title of the festival,

What Makes Us Human?

Is being in even higher control of the machine,

as she could do.

[Francesca laughing]

Yeah, I mean there will still be

kind of street style photography,

there will still be wedding photography,

and I think as a photographer, you know,

there will still be models that people want on the cover,

and in campaigns, because their personalities,

it s also about character or people that have a voice.

So in that way I think you should not see it

as a trap, but more as a tool to help you

if you wanna enhance your picture with something

that s hard, because there s no budget

or you have dreams.

[Carlijn laughing]

No, we are asking ourself a lot of question

because next year is 60 anniversary for Vogue Italia,

and the other day we spoke with Benedetta Barzini,

who was the first woman of the cover of Vogue Italia

60 years ago.

And she said, On set I was an object.

For me it was horrible, the job back then.

I was an object, I was nothing.

I was just there to be a mannequin.

Today in Bella s shoot, Bella was giving ideas

for the prompt.

So I mean, the changes of the job of the model,

for example.

So really I think to look forward

we also, what we are trying to do,

is look where we come from and how all those jobs

have evolved from-

And how exactly it s more and more about collaboration,

about exchanging ideas, about sharing.

I feel exactly this is together with-

And I feel also people feel more responsible

when they have a certain following,

to kind of raise their voice, because it s also important.

Absolutely.

Well, then we are I think we don t have time

for other questions, I really wanna thank you all,

Carlijn.

[Carlijn] Thank you.

Francie, Juan.

[audience clapping]

Thank you.

[Francesca] Thank you, Alessia, for inviting us.

[Alessia] Thank you.

[audience clapping]