FMC #04

08.09 / The new blind workshop at MART in Rovereto and Turin
We are ready for the new workshop at MART in Rovereto.
As part of the 45th Festival organized by Oriente Occidente, we will test the beta version of the game STATUS QUⒺST together with blind and visually impaired participants and our partner Inventivio.
The workshop will be open to the general public, who will have the opportunity to try out the game mechanics and the tactile device Tactonom.
The workshop will then move to Turin for a final session with local communities, gathering feedback and making final refinements to the prototype.

15.09 / New courses at the University of Turin
Starting in September, Fondazione M-Cube will launch two new workshops within the Department of Humanities / Communication Studies at the University of Turin. The workshops, focusing on Modern Mythology & Communication Design, aim to train professionals in communication and storytelling practices for the Cultural and Creative Industries.
These professionals act as “voices” of change, translating emerging trends and data into innovative cultural communication designed to resonate across generations, with a greater awareness of the ongoing evolution of the key pillars shaping our world.

25-26.09 / XXII. Conference Culture and Computer Science – Remixing analog and digital (Berlin)
At the end of September, we will be in Berlin with the project Eternal Cities / See The Invisible.
We will present our new scientific paper Cities as Emotional-Cognitive Constructs. Panoramic view to access Myth, Memory, and Meaning by Emanuela Zilio and Chiara Masiero Sgrinzatto, and we will set up the demo exhibition Crafting Immersive Showcases – Hybrid Tools for Phygital Storytelling. MultipliCity and See The Invisible at the KulturForum.

The news went around the globe as if it were an alien invasion: Anna Wintour steps down. The über-powerful editor of Vogue America has announced she is leaving her position as editor-in-chief after a career that began in 1988, while still taking on an “overview” role for all Condé Nast titles, especially the international editions of Vogue. In other words, she has no intention of actually retiring.
May I add: what a pity!

If there’s one common denominator in the fashion world – and particularly in fashion journalism – it is the servility towards figures who have spent years building and cementing a centralized, egomaniacal position that doesn’t always correspond to genuine professional value, especially when judged over the long term.

You don’t need to be a fashion addict to know that The Devil Wears Prada – both book and film – is directly inspired by her, based on the account of one of her assistants who survived years of cruelty and abuse. On screen, Miranda Priestley, the demonic editor of Runway, amuses audiences with her Disney-stepmother wickedness. In real life, however, I challenge anyone to find anything positive in a boss who rules through a kingdom of fear.

I vividly recall one rare moment of collective clarity when she was booed in Milan a few years ago for imposing a change in the Fashion Week dates simply because they didn’t fit her personal schedule. Who do you think you are? as the Spice Girls would say.

So who is Anna Wintour? A genius in the history of fashion, or a master manipulator of the press devoted to her own cult of personality?

First of all, let’s clarify something: if we are to identify a truly pivotal figure in this field, in the same role, that person is certainly not Anna, but Diana Vreeland. She, first at Harper’s Bazaar and later at Vogue, shaped at least three decades of fashion aesthetics, launching the careers of couturiers, designers, photographers, and models like no one before—or since.

While these days of career retrospectives for “Queen Anna” see tabloids gushing over her stroke of genius in pairing a stunning neo-Byzantine Christian Lacroix jacket with ripped jeans—thus inventing modern styling—very few are asking what her actual contribution to fashion storytelling has been. Which designers has she truly nurtured and launched? Four names stand out: Marc Jacobs, Thom Browne, Proenza Schouler, and Miuccia Prada. 

As a teacher of fashion history, whenever I’m asked to talk about Marc Jacobs, I feel a genuine sense of embarrassment. Talk about what? Which innovation? Which historical moment? Nothing but good marketing dressed up as substance. Thom Browne? Let’s just point out that he’s the partner of Andrew Bolton, the icy curator of the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, who just happens to be Wintour’s right hand in organizing the Met Gala. As for the utterly forgettable Proenza Schouler, I’ll skip right over them and move to Miuccia Prada. When it comes to overrated names, she deserves a chapter of her own. The Devil doesn’t wear Prada by chance—or by choice. Quite simply, Prada bought the Devil. How furious poor Gianfranco Ferré was when Anna Wintour compiled a list of the world’s best designers and—who would have guessed—Prada was the only Italian on a list dominated by Americans with a token few French. No Armani, no Versace, no Ferré, no Valentino. A list as childish as it was dramatic, revealing a closed and non-meritocratic system built on an “inner circle” of chosen ones for the sake of mutual flattery.

Turning the Met Gala into a spectacle that makes Barnum’s Circus look like a premiere at La Scala has not been enough to chip away at the leaden statue, complete with bob and sunglasses. Because Anna is Anna, and she’s still Anna. In an age when being cruel is “cool,” the Queen has reigned unchallenged, eliminating any possible rival. But what will happen if the crown now passes to someone with more talent and courtesy? Perhaps we’d discover that it’s the only trend that looks good on everyone—even when it’s out of fashion.

Discover the video talks by Fondazione M-Cube, starting from the world of fashion and then gliding into the vast universe of Modern Mythologies!

Double Zip

curated by Grita
filming and editing by Simona Rapisarda

With Algorithmic Aesthetics, Grita and Fabrizio Modina invite us to reflect on how social media enters the fashion scene, reshaping it and introducing new players to the game.
What happens to identity and meaning in the frenzy of the algorithm? And where do subcultures end up?

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Discover the FASHION HERITAGE ACADEMY!

In the height of summer 2025, we revisit a timeless classic that left a profound mark on both cinema and fashion history: Belle de Jour (1967), the iconic collaboration between director Luis Buñuel, actress Catherine Deneuve, and designer Yves Saint Laurent.

This creative triangle transformed the female body into a symbolic territory, traversed by both desire and repression.
In Buñuel’s surrealist cinema, desire is always an enigma, and in Belle de Jour, that mystery is expressed precisely through clothing. The film is not just a tale of repressed fantasies—it is a sharp critique of bourgeois hypocrisy. Within this framework, fashion becomes once again a narrative device, and Yves Saint Laurent, who designed the protagonist’s costumes, serves as its silent architect.

The film tells the story of Séverine (played by Deneuve), a young bourgeois woman living with her doctor husband in a cocooned world of tea cups and silk robes. Yet beneath her composed surface lies an urge to rebel—to break the rules of a perfectly packaged life. And so, each afternoon, she secretly visits a brothel under the pseudonym Belle de Jour.
Her body moves between two parallel lives, with clothing acting as a bridge between them.

For the film, Yves Saint Laurent—Deneuve’s close friend and long-time collaborator—created a wardrobe of striking contrasts: rigid silhouettes such as the iconic beige dress and knee-length skirt suits, juxtaposed with more provocative pieces like the famous black vinyl trench coat. Every detail narrates both bourgeois perfection and the abyss lurking beneath it.

Fashion theorist Eugenia Paulicelli, in her book Moda e cinema in Italia (2020), speaks of a true synergy between fashion and cinema. In Belle de Jour, clothing is not just costume—it becomes “script stitched in fabric.” Saint Laurent doesn’t merely dress a body; he clothes Séverine’s “social persona.” And when she undresses—seemingly a gesture of liberation—it is anything but. Even her naked body is not truly free, but remains under surveillance, still inscribed within the bourgeois code she tries to escape.

Social judgment, in fact, manifests even in the absence of fabric, projecting itself onto the body like an invisible garment. In this sense, fashion becomes a language of the unspoken; even when absent, clothing continues to speak.

The lesson of Belle de Jour still resonates today. The protagonist’s restrained, minimal-chic style has influenced generations of designers and lives on in contemporary trends like the coveted “old money” aesthetic and a nostalgic vision of understated femininity.
But what makes this film truly timeless is not just its aesthetics. It is its power to expose—both literally and symbolically—the hypocrisy of the bourgeois world, and the role fashion plays in upholding or disrupting its masks.

Luis Buñuel and Yves Saint Laurent deliver a powerful reflection on who we are, what we desire, and how we’re allowed to appear. And Catherine Deneuve, icy and enigmatic, walks between these worlds with the elegance of someone wearing a secret…

NEW FORMATS FOR YOU
This summer, together with our collaborators, we are preparing a series of surprises for you…
With Angela De Marco, a brand-new MAGAZINE is on its way.
With Nicolas Casari, we are launching an all-new FILM SERIES.
And with Giorgia Casari, a brand-new PODCAST will open up a space to talk about real life, leave behind prejudices, and find the courage to engage with all the complexities of the human experience.

SUPERHEROES – FROM ANTIQUITY TO CONTEMPORARY
The exhibition curated by Fabrizio Modina for Fondazione M-Cube, with Federica Montani and Eugenio Martera for Contemporanea Progetti, continues with great success at the Vapriikki Museokeskus in Tampere, Finland.
A hyper-dynamic and super-pop journey through the history of heroes from the past to the present.
The exhibition explores the archetypes of superheroes as they appear in ancient myths and legends. Visitors can trace the evolution of the superhero both chronologically and thematically.

RESEARCH & INNOVATION
Fondazione M-Cube’s research continues on multiple fronts with scientific papers and the exhibition See the Invisible, which will be presented at:

• SiGraDi 2025, la conferenza su “Meta-Responsive Approaches in Architecture, Art, Design, and Sciences”
  Cordoba (Argentina)
• GDI 2025 Green + Digital + Intelligent Built Environments
  Auckland (New Zealand)