Matrix inspires Guram Gvasalia

Back to the future could be the motto chosen by Guram Gvasalia, artistic director of the Vetements collective, for his spring-summer 2022 collection. The brother of Demna, designer of Balenciaga, was once again inspired by a film that marked more than one generation and which is still very current today in its words and aesthetic: Matrix. The retro-futuristic silhouettes imagined by Gvasalia for his new collection raise questions about an era characterised by the leadership of digital technology and by an increasingly accentuated co-existence between the virtual and the real.

Black microglasses, flowing leather jackets and trenches, vinyl trousers and accessories, structured dresses, austere boots: the looks of Neo and Trinity, the two iconic characters created in 1999 by the Wachowski sisters, return to the catwalk at a time when the world of the metaverse, which is becoming increasingly vast and complex, NFTs and crypto-currencies, are pushing us a little more towards the dystopian universe imagined in the film.

Since the creation of the Vetements collective in 2014, the two Georgian designers Demna and Guram Gvasalia have always put forward an exquisite taste for provocation, for the underground dimension, and for an iconoclastic vision of fashion and beauty. When Demna left the brand to focus on the Balenciaga collections, Guram took over as sole executive.

For the new collection, the 129 models on offer are photographed on a checkerboard background similar to that of the Photoshop image editing software. While the total black look is the preferred tone, a few motifs remain: baggy sweatshirts with slogans and pixelated prints plunge us into the universe of one of the most influential cult films in pop culture. The post-apocalyptic aesthetic of Matrix is perfectly in tune with the times, with its concerns about the ongoing war, the rise of virtual reality and the impact of an ultra-connected world on everyday life and society.

Matrix has always been a source of inspiration for many designers. In the year of the film's release, John Galliano was the first to draw on the film's aesthetic codes for his autumn-winter collection for Dior. In the meantime, the film was released in the spring and grossed $460 million and won the Oscars. For this spring 2022, the designers of Balmain, Alaïa and ACNE Studio have also drawn from The Matrix, taking inspiration in particular from the character of Trinity, with her strong and combative femininity.