Life imitates art direction (emphasis on the L)
GCDS calling the paparazzi instead of a producer, MARC Jacob's birthday cake fail... Non-production techniques and life exaggerated have been winning since 2022, but here's why they win in 2024 too.
In 2022, I wrote about 10 trends I believed had peaked. It included Life Imitates Art (Direction), but wow - wasn't I wrong about that! It's only gone from strength to strength, peak to summit.
Life Imitates Art (Direction) is a content style that lightly exaggerates typical life and uses low to non-production techniques for capture (i.e. CCTV, paparazzi, live streams, iPhone).
For example; Supreme's S/S 2022 shoot exaggerated the typical with a mile-high-club glamour but on a mid-range Boeing 777, and Heaven exampled low to no production by having cult celebs take selfies as a means to event capture.
Lo-fi capture makes elite/extraordinary moments feel relatable (#mood *tags friend* "lol") and puts the real in surrealism, or, on the flip, doing something alt with an iPhone is an easy way to stretch reality as it turns something so known and real, unreal.
As mentioned in my previous article, I don't know if IRL AD has been happening forever, but my home-, fy- and discovery- pages had an influx in 2022 and it remains on my feed today in 2024 - but why?
It's no news, Gen Z is, has been nihilistic (it used to be constant, but now there’s just a residue of doom) and has been using surrealism to cope. Surrealism lets them both escape and undermine the world. Escape shows up in nonsensical content that displays how nothing is real or matters. Undermining happens through coded comms, faux narratives and dismissive performances that aim to resist the algorithm and stick it to "The Man".
In 2022, brands used IRL AD for surrealism, and in 2024 failure and Ls have been added to the content tapping into Gen Z’s nihilism and desire to undermine.
☆ MARC Jacobs is breaking the internet with CCTV footage of Lil Uzi Vert holding an overwhelmingly large birthday cake - eek!
☆ PASTDOWN's is having a car crash to flog jackets
☆ GCDS is calling the paparazzi instead of a producer for their latest shoot (the same goes for Bottega, Maje, Diesel, and Priscavera).
☆ Ye admitted he could only afford a 3-pixel-strong selfie video for his YEEZY Superbowl commercial.
They’re all Ls. They’re all failures. They’re all chaos that “couldn't be me”.
Brands have smartly played into surrealism and nihilism (and humans’ negative bias) with narratives that lightly exaggerate life fails, and maintain relatability through non-production.
In sum, Life imitates art direction and if you emphasise the Ls you’ll produce creatives that have youth appeal … but the biggest Ws is when you truly undermine “The Man”, and Ye’s shitty selfie as a Superbowl ad was best in class example of that. The audacity.
Thanks for reading my silly little thoughts, but I’d love to know yours too. Share them below on my Linkedin (I read everything).
till the next time i start typing…
lol, emily chapps :)