Diane Pernet On The Latest Edition Of Her Fashion Film Festival

Diane Pernet is a name that is synonymous with fashion and film. The New York turned Parisian fashion writer, blogger and videographer was one of the very first—if not the first—fashion blogger, having founded her blog, A Shaded View On Fashion, back in 2005. Now, looking back, it’s crazy to think what has happened with fashion and blogging over the past 16 years. She literally sparked a firestorm.

Shortly after founding her blog, Pernet founded a film festival called A Shaded View On Fashion Film Festival, which focuses on the intersection between fashion and film. Before this festival, fashion films were understood as simply commercials for brands, or even worse, just to sell a product.

Now, fashion films are becoming more mainstream, creating layered storytelling around fashion icons like Karl Lagerfeld, and are cross-disciplinary, bleeding into dance, photography and music.

Since the pandemic pushed luxury retail online, prompting an e-commerce boom. With holiday shopping underway, luxury fashion brands are depending on video now, more than ever—whether it’s livestreaming online shopping events or flat out video shopping.

Obviously, it’s more than just money. For this year’s 13th edition of the world’s foremost fashion film festival, Pernet has enlisted four curators to show the world what fashion film is made of. She talks about her star-studded jury, upcoming filmmakers and the freshest new venue in Paris.

What makes this year’s festival different from the others?

Diane Pernet: This is the first physical event I’ve had in the past two years. For this edition, I decided to have four external curators, something that I’d never done before. I chose four themes and then, their curators: Conscious Fashion curated by Bandana Tewari, Digital Fashion curated by the Fabricant/Amber Jae Slooten, Black Spectrum curated by Melissa Alibo, and Fashion Moves curated by Dr. Alexandra Murray-Leslie, which are fashion films mad through spontaneous socially mediated ways of pop music, styling, and choreography such as Tiktok.

What are some highlights from this year's program?

There will be a panel discussion called Creating Your World for the Metaverse with the Fabricant, Amber will be coming direct from Miami Basel to this discussion, who is a master in this field, French performance artist Orlan, who has already had a second robot made of her body, and Alex Murray Leslie, who has been working with technology in performance and has a more academic approach to where we are going in the future.

Each year, how do you choose the grand jury? It's always a mix of creative talents across many genres and disciplines that go far beyond fashion.

This year’s jury president is Bruce LaBruce and working with him has been a pleasure as he is totally involved, we discuss a lot, and yes, I always have a rather diverse jury from artists like the wonderful Unskilled Worker, to musicians Roisin Murphy, Alex Murray Leslie, and Daphne Guinness,  fashion designers LUTZ and Andre Walker, art curator at the Tate Modern Osei Bonsu, and more. I like different points of view. I’ve never been into cliché fashion and the jury always is a reflection of that.

What can you say about the rise of fashion filmmaking? It used to be such a niche art, but I feel it has become more commercial.

It’s true. Now there is not a brand, large or small that doesn’t create fashion films. Of course, during lockdown, many designers were forced to think about films versus catwalks. Some of the most successful were Demna Gvasalia at Balenciaga with The Simpsons. He is always ahead of the game when it comes to innovative ideas and a bit of irony. Probably, in the beginning, it was more about showing product and now it is more about storytelling.

Are there any up and coming fashion filmmakers you want to mention?

I really like the work of Francis Wintour. I discovered his work in ASVOFF10 and its great to watch his work evolve. I really like the films of KidSuper/Colm Dillon very much, the Safdie brothers, Thomas Gerard, he did a film called “La Malle,” which has almost a Costa-Gavras quality, Bruce LaBruce and I were discussing it and he thought that was what James Bond should have looked like.

What is the best part of this year’s film festival?

Probably the best thing that has happened is now ASVOFF has a new home at 35/37, which is the latest venture from Comme des Garcons. It is located at the Hotel de Coulanges on rue des Francs-Bourgeois in Paris, and is dedicated to creation, community exchanges. It’s a venue for fashion, art, dance, music and of course, film. Working with the company president, Adrian Joffe is really out of a dream. And he has a dream team. I cannot tell you how happy I am being there. It is exactly what Paris was lacking and I’m happy to have a new home.

For more information visit the film festival’s website or Diane Pernet’s blog. Follow Diane Pernet on Instagram @asvof.