A black and white meditation on the unconscious, brought to life by Duane Michals and Jacob Elordi.

There are fashion campaigns that present a product, and then there are those that attempt to shift the way we perceive images, memory and meaning itself. Bottega Veneta, a house known for its quiet luxury and sculptural precision, chooses the latter path with What Are Dreams, a project created in collaboration with the visionary photographer and filmmaker Duane Michals and Australian actor Jacob Elordi.

Presented as a short film and a photo series, the project unfolds entirely in black and white, set within the intimate rooms of Michals home in New York. It is a space filled with light, shadow, and the quiet immensity of a man who has spent more than six decades examining the mysterious inner landscapes of human experience.

Together, Michals and Elordi build a world that feels both familiar and foreign, drawn from the unconscious and shaped by the language of Surrealism. It is a campaign in the loosest sense of the word. It is more accurately a meditation, a poem in motion, a visual riddle that invites the viewer not to decode it, but to feel its strange electricity.

A Maison That Speaks in Symbols

Bottega Veneta has never pursued the obvious. Under the direction of Matthieu Blazy, the house leans toward the thoughtful and the tactile, focusing on mood rather than spectacle and on craft rather than noise.

What Are Dreams continues this lineage. Here, the brand does not show bags or leather goods in the traditional sense. Instead it offers a world of symbols: clocks without hands, mirrors that refuse clarity, shadows that stretch like unanswered questions. These motifs speak in whispers, not declarations, honouring the Maison’s belief that luxury is not a matter of volume, but of presence.

The project is anchored in Duane Michals unique visual dialect, one shaped by decades of experimentation with staged photography, written text, sequential imagery and dream logic. His work has always occupied the threshold between reality and imagination. In What Are Dreams he invites Bottega Veneta into this space, offering the Maison a lens through which to speak to the unconscious.

Jacob Elordi as the Dreamer

At the centre of the series stands Jacob Elordi, a figure whose presence carries both modern glamour and vulnerable introspection. In recent years he has emerged as one of the most compelling actors of his generation, known for roles that explore desire, memory and emotional tension.

In Michals world Elordi becomes more than a model. He becomes a dreamer, a wanderer through the spaces of the mind. He appears against walls that seem to breathe, next to props that feel symbolic rather than functional, and within scenes that are staged but never static.

The simplicity of the black and white palette brings new dimensions to his presence. Stripped of colour, his expressions take on a ghostly honesty. Every gesture, every glance, feels suspended in time. He does not perform; he exists. He does not sell; he inhabits.

A Film Built on Poetry

What Are Dreams is anchored by a poem written by Duane Michals in 2001, published in his photo book Questions Without Answers. The poem begins with a simple inquiry, yet expands into an exploration of the surreal landscapes that emerge when the mind drifts into sleep.

Elordi reads the poem aloud in the short film, his voice steady and gentle, guiding the viewer into the quiet strangeness of the unconscious. The poem describes dreams as “midnight movies of the mind,” places where objects appear familiar yet entirely altered, where logic dissolves and imagination creates new truths.

Michals often incorporates text into his photographs, treating handwriting as both image and voice. In this project excerpts of the poem appear across several still images, written in his own hand, looping and leaning as though drawn directly from the realm of reverie. This union of text and image brings intimacy to the work. It feels private, as though we have been invited into someone’s inner thoughts.

The Surreal and the Uncanny

Surrealism has always thrived on contradictions, embracing the unexpected and the unsettling. Michals uses this lineage not as nostalgia but as living language. His images carry the uncanny aura of early Surrealist cinema, moments that appear simple on the surface yet shift subtly the longer one observes them.

Elordi is staged among enigmatic props: ladders that lead nowhere, frames within frames, shadows cast in impossible directions. Each element is chosen with precision, not to confuse the viewer but to evoke the sensation of walking through a dream that has its own internal logic.

This is where Bottega Veneta’s identity aligns beautifully with Michals vision. The Maison is known for sculptural design and emotional quietude. Its pieces often play with structure, volume and negative space. In What Are Dreams this sensibility extends beyond product and into mood. The campaign becomes an atmosphere rather than an advertisement.

A Home as a Stage

The choice to film at Duane Michals New York home brings an intimacy that large scale studio productions rarely capture. His living space is filled with decades of art, objects and personal memory. It becomes a character in its own right.

Rooms appear narrow, then open. Windows become portals. Staircases twist upward like questions without resolution. Elordi walks through this domestic labyrinth as if he is drifting through someone else’s memory or perhaps his own.

The home setting reinforces the emotional tenor of the project. Dreams belong to private life. They happen in silence. They happen at night. They belong to the shadowy corners of the mind. By situating the project in Michals personal space, Bottega Veneta allows the viewer to enter this secret territory.

A Dialogue Between Past and Present

Duane Michals career spans more than sixty years. Jacob Elordi was born decades after some of Michals most iconic works first emerged. Yet the collaboration between the two feels effortless, almost inevitable.

It represents a dialogue between generations, between analog craft and digital culture, between the pioneering spirit of twentieth century Surrealist photography and the contemporary language of fashion.

Bottega Veneta, positioned at the crossroads of tradition and experimentation, becomes the bridge between these worlds. It does not absorb the artists into its brand identity. Instead it allows them to shape the narrative. What Are Dreams is a reminder that luxury can be conceptual, and that images can hold meaning beyond aesthetics.

A Study in Quiet Bravery

In a fashion environment often dominated by noise, speed and visual saturation, Bottega Veneta offers something radically different: a moment of stillness.

What Are Dreams is not designed to go viral. It is not structured around a product reveal or a commercial slogan. It asks the viewer to pause, to reflect, to dwell in the discomfort and beauty of ambiguity.

It is brave in its simplicity and powerful in its restraint. It rewards contemplation rather than consumption. In this quietness, the campaign becomes a luxury object in itself.

A Dream That lingers

What Are Dreams does not end when the film fades to black. The images and lines of poetry linger in the mind like the final traces of a dream.

It invites viewers to consider their own midnight landscapes. It reminds us that imagination is a living space, and that the most profound stories are often told in whisper, shadow and silence.

In the hands of Duane Michals and Jacob Elordi, Bottega Veneta transforms a campaign into an introspective experience. It asks a simple question. It leaves the answer beautifully open.

Written by: Linh Giang Nguyen
Published on: 26th November 2025