The House’s latest campaign to present the first collection in the centenary year of Gucci captures the revolutionary and joyful impetus of eros as the creative force behind contemporary imagery, shot by photographers Mert Alas and Marcus Piggott, with creative direction by Alessandro Michele.

It’s the birth of Eros, ancient and primigenial force, that drives the desire through the attempt to mend a separation. The myth, in fact, identifies in the relationship with the Other the vital impulse that obliges each of us to restore a lost unity,” says Alessandro Michele in his notes on the campaign.

Underlining an aesthetic that connects mind and body, models read works or essays on desire, such as ‘Simulacra and Simulation’ by Jean Baudrillard, ‘The Work of Art in the Age of its Technical Reproducibility’ by Walter Benjamin, ‘Bodies that Matter’ by Judith Butler, ‘Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex’ by Sigmund Freud and ‘Sexistence’ by Jean-Luc Nancy. “Knowledge itself becomes an object of desire… So the books of Freud, Nancy and Butler describe the universe of desire, and more, they become objects of attraction themselves. As a consequence, words transfigure into an amorous lexicon.

Alongside the cast, personally chosen by Alessandro Michele, the Creative Director also invited a selection of special guests to take part in the campaign: the multi-platinum selling Italian band Måneskin and American model Kristen McMenamy.