Review of Balenciaga Spring 2024 Ad Campaign by Creative Director Demna Gvasalia with Photographer Jitka Hanzlová and models Ella Gvasalia, BFRND, Linda Loppa, Eliza Douglas, Renata Litvinova, Krish Ghai, Tommy Blue, Noureddine Boudaakat, Simone Embrack, Bibi Hoad, Jay Pak, and Khadim Sock
The cult of Demna deepens with Balenciaga’s Spring 2024 campaign – or does it? The imagery was lensed by photographer Jitka Hanzlová, who explores a tension between surface and interiority that raises questions about image, status, and depth.
The portrait series reflects Demna’s personal world and the identities that comprise his community by featuring his family and friends. The talent involved includes Ella, Demna’s mother; his husband, musician BFRND; his former professor and fashion education icon Linda Loppa; artist Eliza Douglas; actress Renata Litvinova; friend of the House Krish Ghai; and several recurring Balenciaga runway models.
These personalities are captured in images that continue the house’s recent-ish pivot towards more straightforward portraiture for its campaigns, but evolves it in a more interesting conceptual direction thanks to some clever phygital finagling. Each model stands before a physical image of an ornate interior that has been printed at full scale, creating an almost seamless trompe-l’oeil transition from foreground to background. The approach seems to point out a disconnect between image and reality, perhaps inviting commentary on the facades of social media or the rise of artificial intelligence – themes that take on further dimension given the mansion-like pseudo-locations’ deceptive appearance of wealth, power, and status.
The spatial illusion is further called into question in the accompanying series of videos, in which the backdrop is taken down to reveal the reality of the humble studio space behind it, or in which the incongruence of perspective is illuminated by the movements of the model. The clever visual concept makes for a subtly disarming and striking set of imagery, and it nicely plays into the idea of virtual vs. reality that the brand has been exploring recently (especially notably in the set of its recent runway show).
In a way, however, it might be a bit too on the nose. Demna has been repeating himself a lot lately, and has made some plays to pop-culture triteness and elitism (see, for example, the Erewhon collaboration). This campaign seems to gently nudge at Balenciaga’s own narrative depth, perhaps in a self-aware jest. Is this jest a commentary on superficiality, and if so, does the act of self-awareness around it diminish its impact?
This isn’t a question with a single, straightforward answer. For admirers of Demna’s work, who find value and resonance in his reflective approach to fashion’s surface-level aesthetics, this latest campaign marks another captivating chapter in what can be described as a stylishly self-aware journey.
Balenciaga Creative Director | Demna Gvasalia
Photographer | Jitka Hanzlová
Models | Ella Gvasalia, BFRND, Linda Loppa, Eliza Douglas, Renata Litvinova, Krish Ghai, Tommy Blue, Noureddine Boudaakat, Simone Embrack, Bibi Hoad, Jay Pak, and Khadim Sock