BOTTEGA VENETA UNVEILS ‘WHAT ARE DREAMS’ BY DUANE MICHALS, STARRING JACOB ELORDI
words by VERONICA TLAPANCO SZABÓ
Billowing curtains, a tilted pedestal, a suspended feather, Bottega Veneta’s latest campaign stars Jacob Elordi in his most poetic form yet captured by Duane Michals. Elordi is already a Bottega Veneta muse, as per his ambassadorship for the brand since 2024, now taking his street style staple to the silver screen. By now we are used to seeing the Andiamo bag nonchalantly slung over his shoulder as he sips the tiniest of espressos in Soho while balancing a book in his other hand. That very energy is carried over in this short film with an opening shot of Elordi in a rocking chair, reading from Duane Michals’ 2001 poem What Are Dreams? Attempting, perhaps, to answer that perduring question. Through his voice, Michals’ words, first printed in his photo book Questions Without Answers float between the unconscious, the imaginary and the uncanny.
images and video courtesy of BOTTEGA VENETA
Shot in black and white at Michals’ New York home, the film feels off-kilter and achingly beautiful all at the same time. Some of the surreal compositions such as headless busts, a crystal ball poised before Elordi’s face nod to long-time influences of Michals from surrealism, Giorgio de Chirico and René Magritte. Others shots left us pensive, like the old man swaying a few puppets above Elordi’s open palms, as if he were ready to catch the magic midair.
Duane Michals has long been preoccupied with making the invisible visible in his oeuvre, and film perhaps is the best suited medium for this, as he reminds us, it is itself a waking fantasy. And Elordi? He embodies that threshold perfectly. There’s a touch of magic to him, the kind that feels almost prophetic, especially with his latest role as Frankenstein. All in all we might not yet know what dreams are exactly but Jacob Elordi feels like the closest thing to one.
