The Art Of Beauty

Artist Tina Barney takes inspiration from the old masters to showcase Gucci designer Alessandro Michele’s thoroughly modern make-up collection.

- Alexander Fury

I love a beautiful face, but what really captivates me is a story,” says Gucci creative director Alessandro Michele. This sentiment fits perfectly with his eclectic, electric vision of clothing for gender bending romantics who live in plissé lamés and beaded cardigans with stories embedded in their very fabric. But we’re not talking about fashion today; we’re discussing the debut of Michele’s Gucci cosmetics line. Beauty is a multi billion-dollar industry all about faces, which makes his statement a little unusual. Yet just as the designer has reinvented everything Gucci from the Italian luxury brand’s ad campaigns to its store design over the past four years since he ascended to the top job, he has now reimagined make-up in his own extraordinarily creative image.