American Diane Pernet, founder of the ASVOFF fashion film festival, reveals the highlights of the 2024 edition

For four days, from November 7 to 10, 2024, at Dover Street Market, in Paris, more than 130 films are screened at ASVOFF (A Shaded View on Fashion Film), the world’s first film festival dedicated to fashion, style and beauty. Legendary and emerging directors are evaluated by a jury of personalities from fashion, cinema and design, chaired this year by fashion muse, model and performer Michèle Lamy.

It is not just a competition for short films on fashion and culture, it is an international event offering feature films, documentaries, master classes, conferences, live performances and art installations. This must-have on the fashion calendar and film circuit offers an official selection of 30 films from the four corners of the globe. In addition to out-of-competition student films, this edition addresses many current themes: mental health in fashion, films generated by AI, Chinese fashion films, Queer archive, climate warriors…

Pionleader in the field of digital media with her fashion blog A Shaded View on Fashion created in 2005, Diane Permet also made cinema appearances in the films Ready-to-wear de Robert Altman, Zoolander 2 de Ben Stiller, The Ninth Gate by Roman Polanski, Balenciaga The Lost Tape by Harmony Korine. Meeting with this American journalist based in Paris, photographer and stylist, recognizable look among a thousand – cbun topped with a veil, fluttering sunglasses and ankle-length raincoat, all in full black – which retraces its journey and lifts the veil on the themes of the ASVOFF 2024 festival.

Franceinfo Culture: Journalist, photographer, documentalist, fashion designer and critic, talent scout, blogger, costume designer, curator of film projects. It’s a very rich journey.
Diane Pernet: I studied cinema and then I was a photographer, but not fashion! After nine months of studying fashion, I created my luxury women’s ready-to-wear brand in New York for thirteen years. I even had a license in Tokyo for five years. I came to France in the early 1990s where I first worked on a fashion show before writing for Elle.com and Vogue.fr.

ASVOF is the name of your blog created in 2005. Three years later, you launched the ASVOFF festival.
In 2005, I created ASVOF my fashion blog. At that time there were a lot of them, but they were mostly political. The following year, I created the festival. The first edition, which was called You Wear it Well (title of a song by Rod Stewart) started in Los Angeles, because I thought Los Angeles was very well known for cinema, but not for fashion, whereas Paris is extraordinary, it’s good for both ! For almost three years, I had a collaborator, then there was a break in 2008. There, I changed the name to ASVOFF, the first edition of which was launched in September at the National Jeu de Paume Museum, in Paris . Alongside the festival, I continued my blog.

At its launch, ASVOFF was an international festival. Itinerant, he started in Paris, then traveled the world.
From the start, it was an international vision, especially the first four years. It was really itinerant, I traveled a lot with the festival. He started in Paris, then moved to other cities such as New York, London, Tokyo, Milan, Moscow, Mexico, China and even South America. The festival still travels from time to time, but it is now ad hoc. From 2009 to 2015, he moved to the Center Pompidou in Paris. But for four years, he has been in the Marais, where the Dover Street Market is today. [ouvert en mai 2023, c’est un concept store avant-gardiste fondé par Rei Kawakubo et Adrian Joffe].

You have obtained approval from the French Ministry of Culture. A recognition which testifies to your contribution to French cultural heritage and its commitment to fashion and aesthetics in cinema.
Yes, it was last year. I’m delighted, because I do a lot of things for this city. This support is a passion and recognition, but unfortunately it does not bring money. Maybe in the future, since it’s a really important cultural festival.

How has this festival evolved since its creation?
At first it was more fashion, but over the years it has diversified and now it’s all themes that I find important in life. The heart of the festival remains fashion, but not the cliché side. The year Jean Paul Gauthier was president of the festival he told me: “Everything is fashion“. And I agree with him. I choose the president of the jury and the jury for the official selection of films. For the other prizes – the more societal themes – it is the president of each jury who chooses his own jury and presents its prize, on the programming side, for five or six years, I have added new themes and categories that are more in tune with the times, such as Black Spectrum, films generated by AI, TikTok…

What is the menu for the 2024 edition?
It’s always “sustainability” [durabilité] but rather focused on the regeneration of textiles. There are short and feature films, master classes, documentaries, conferences, live performances, artistic installations, or 130 films in total, including 30 in the official selection. I’m also taking up last year’s theme of Climate Warriors for Kids and Teens, because I really want to know their vision of the future. Mental Health and Fashion is a new theme, mental health in fashion is important because there are lots of stress issues for people who work there.

The first day, November 7, is projected the documentary Quant, directed by Sadie Frost, which pays homage to a figure at the forefront of fashion in the 1960s and 1970s.
With this film, we get into the heart of the festival with the creator of the short skirt, it’s really pure fashion. This stylist revolutionized fashion, she is the first woman who did so many things. It’s major in the world and I think it’s interesting to see what she’s doing. This is the film of the opening ceremony screened in the evening.

In the afternoon, before this screening, I propose Fashioned Out, short films recounting the atmosphere of the collections during Paris Fashion Week 2002. They were commissioned by Galeries Lafayette for their windows. I imagine it’s fun for people – who at the time were only 5 years old – to see what fashion was like twenty-two years ago in Paris, Milan, New York and London.

Your festival addresses societal themes such as fashion films generated by artificial intelligence.
There, we are at the heart of what is happening at the moment and the debates that are taking place in society. This is the second time that I have presented this very interesting and important theme.

The morning of November 9 is devoted, for example, to Climate Warriors Kids & Teens, a program dedicated to young people aged 6 to 16 who are sensitive to environmental issues.
It’s something that takes up a lot of space in our heads, because many animals and fish have disappeared, so it’s important to see the children’s vision! We ask them to make short films to show how they see the future: 30 seconds for kids, 60 for teens. They submit their project in small MP4 formats shot on their smartphones. The president of the Kids jury is 13 years old and that of the Teens jury is 15 years old. This is their vision of the future, these proposals. Their works and creations will then be posted online on the platform.

The festival ends on November 10 with the awards ceremony.
The festival is open to the public, except for the evenings of the opening and closing ceremonies. Now paid for, it was free for thirteen years.