This is pretty wild ride to read about. IMO, it’s all on Balenciaga. No way they did not approve or make mood boards, have someone, if not 5 people on set, and then have teams of people sign off on this before it went live. Suing the SET DESIGNER for $25 million? Give me a break. Balenciaga screwed the pooch here and need to just say, “Whoops, our bad. In trying to be edgy we pushed to far.” Otherwise, this is gonna just drag out in the new for a loooong time.
“One ad included a child model standing with a teddy bear that was wearing black leather and chains that many compared to BDSM apparel. The other, even stranger, included a pile of legal documents, one of which included the text of a Supreme Court decision related to child pornography.
On Friday, November 25, Balenciaga brought a $25 million lawsuit against North Six for being responsible for the spring ad featuring the Supreme Court documents, but not against the photographer, Chris Maggio. Balenciaga called the inclusion of the document in the ad “malevolent or, at the very least, extraordinarily reckless.”
A rep for North Six told the New York Post that the company had no creative control over the content of the ad. Chris Maggio has not made a statement. Gabriele Galimberti, who shot the teddy bear ad but had no involvement with the spring campaign, said in a statement on Instagram that he too was given no control over the creative content of his shoot, other than details like lighting and framing. The content — pairing child models with the teddy bear bag — had already been decided before he was hired, he said.