Fashion fantasy: W magazine embraces whimsical surrealism

Miami – In a wave of art-meets-film exhibits at Design Miami/ 2013, W magazine’s Suspension of Disbelief emerges as a credible, original stand-alone piece.

The short film, a preview of a longer feature to be released in February 2014, was screened at Miami’s new Perez Art Museum and tells the story of a man (actor Ben Whishaw) who captures and falls in love with a mermaid (model Kristen McMenamy).

Created by fashion photographer Tim Walker, the film opens with Whishaw striding through fields to a stark, empty mansion. As the story unfolds, viewers are shown pictures of McMenamy as a mermaid, ethereal, floating in a tank and trying to escape. The purported legend in the film is that mermaids, once captured by someone they love, grow legs and can escape – and this is what she has done, leaving him to wallow in heartbreak.

So far, so surreal – but that’s the beauty of it. W magazine and Tim Walker, like many creatives and, indeed brands, are playing with the surreal, with mythical creatures and with fantastical narratives that cross over into the real world. We explored this first in our Faction Marketing macrotrend.