ISSUE FOURTEEN

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credits

founder: gaetano pavano publisher: Associazione culturale la plus belle the team: managing director Marco Benanti Editor in chief Gaetano Pavano art director Gaetano Pavano fashion editor Lorena Grisafi GRAPHICs Ganga & his Invisible Friends translations Marco Stefano Doria in this issue: Cover girl Michelle Xiong @Adon Management photographers Greta Bartuccio, Elisa Bonafè, Svetlana Fokina, Sergey Free,

Alessandro Galatoli, Maya Geier, Marina Kudriavsky, Marri Iatsenko, Francesco Lembo, Roberto Manetta, Ivanna Mazza, Maurizio Montani, Daniele Orazi, Gloria Ortenzi, Ellen Simone, Emmanuel Vivier

models Chioma @Espirit Management, Arianna Difrancesco, Martina Di Vaio @ Freemodels Agency Naples, Katerina Karpova @The Wolves Model Management, Abigail Tara Lilly Kent, Katrin Keurov @Major Models Milan, Christina M’Bia, Xenia Moss, Sara Mun, Monet Pei, Olga Soleikina, Julia Spodniewska, Johanna W. @ Stockholmsgruppen

creatives Federico Aragrande, Natalia Benjelloun, Emanuela Bertino, Elena Bocharova, Julia Brig, Marianne Cancrini, Even-Chen, Belinda Chorley, Elisa Colarossi, Carla Dalè, Sara De Blasi, Massimiliano Filippelli, Gaston Flores, Jen Franco, Kristina Galants, Ganesha Jewels, Grimerka39, Kimia Haghighi, Matla Karolina, Esmeralda Kouira, Diana Iatsenko, Shirly Lasry, Rona-Lee, Lucy McKeown, Maayan Levi Meir, Jasmine Lundmark, Vero Mendoza, Ivan Moomin, Maria Mzhelskaya, Nostrasantissima, Quaranta Sette, Yevgeniya Rudyk, Bruce Smith, Dylan Timperanza, Alona Tzalik, Giusy Ucciero assistants Daniela Datonelli, Daniele Federici, Francesca Fontana thanks to La Belle Epoque Mondragone, Simone Malatesta @Associazione Aurea, Ucha

La Plus Belle Magazine is a two-monthly periodic.

Registered at Tribunale di Caltanissetta – N° 406 of 2017, May 12.

La Plus Belle Magazine was born by an idea of the Founder and Editor in Chief, Gaetano Pavano, in the Summer of 2013.

The first issue was released on March 29th, 2014.

La Plus Belle Magazine become a two-monthly periodic from May 2017.

cover model Michelle Xiong @Adon Management photographed by Ivanna Mazza (see the editorial on page 8)

It’s strictly forbidden to reproduce all or part of the contents without the written permission of the Editor in Chief.

All images published are property of their respective authors. They own the copyright © All rights reserved.

Web www.laplusbelle.it Instagram @laplusbellemagazine Facebook www.facebook.com/laplusbellemagazine Info & Inquiries info@laplusbelle.it Submissions www.laplusbelle.it/submit advertising advertising@laplusbelle.it

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editor’s letter Dear Readers, Welcome to our new issue of La Plus Belle Magazine. Issue Fourteen will walk you through the whole Summer.

Sixteen exciting editorials are waiting for you – with outstanding quality, as usual!

Browsing the beautiful photo sets, you will find an article by Adele Loguasto, a Sicilian copywriter, who’s back on this issue to cover another social media topic.

This time, Adele wrote about the censorship of the female nipples over social media.

Very interesting considerations I recommend you to read.

You can find it on page 50.

But that’s not all! You will also find an interview with our dear friend, British actress Victoria Emslie, who has been the very first Cover Model for La Plus Belle in 2014.

She was often our guest on the magazine. Among other topics, Victoria will tell us about a recent and original initiative of hers. Read the full interview on page 92.

Lastly, I’m pleased to announce that we’re going to publish a Special Issue in August. It will showcase the creations of some young Sicilian Fashion Design talents coming from the Accademia di Belle Arti in Catania. Stay tuned!

Issue Fifteen, instead, will be regularly published in September.

See you soon!

Enjoy your reading Gaetano Pavano

actress Victoria Emslie read the interview on page 92

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Oriental Influences

by IVANNA MAZZA model MICHELLE XIONG @ADON MANAGEMENT make-up artist VERO MANDOZA assistant make-up DANIELA DATONELLI hair stylist GASTON FLORES nails JEN FRANCO accessories UCHA

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Pearls

by ROBERTO MANETTA model MONET PEI

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Lazy Day

by SVETLANA FOKINA model OLGA SOLEIKINA creative director SVETLANA FOKINA make-up & hair JULIA BRIG clothing ZARA

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Beau la folie

by DANIELE ORAZI model CHRISTINA M’BIA make-up artist ELISA COLAROSSI

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Hype

by MARINA KUDRIAVSKY wardrobe stylist ELENA BOCHAROVA make-up & hair GRIMERKA39 retoucher MARINA KUDRIAVSKY

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Social world

by Adele Loguasto

Nipples vs. Social Media: the battle for equality.

I love reading Philosophy books. A couple of years ago, my father began collecting one of those series sold with newspapers: small booklets you can read in about one hour.

Now... there is this sort of epidermal pleasure in passing your finger on the book spines and stop it over a title or two: MORAL and FREEDOM. I figured these booklets were quite an easy reading! I opened and read the back cover of both of them.

The first one contained this question: Is there only one right way to live?

The second one, instead, asked the readers: When are you really free?

I don’t think we need to explain the connection between this memory and such an article about the struggle of “Nipples Vs. Social Media”. I think, instead, that by honestly answering these two questions we can get out of such impasse.

Although I am a Social Media Manager, I will respond first as a woman, and a Facebook and Instagram user; I think this is the most authoritative role, after all, to cover this topic. Somebody may not be interested in this subject, gracefully getting over it going like “What should I care, I am not going to post my nipples on Facebook anyway?”. I wish to suggest them to write down these words I am going to borrow from Kerouac: “Ah but, ‘I don’t know, I don’t care, and it doesn’t matter’ will be the final human prayer.”

In the end, this matter affects you too: it also includes who is not willing to ever post their “criminal” nipples, it relates to who is not a professional photographer and will never have to figure out how to post nude on Facebook or Instagram (even altering the aesthetical concept underlying a given shot) and, yes, it also relates

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to who was not aware, until now, of this modest censoring filter on social media.

Maybe this “Free Nipples” business may seem a little silly if compared to others considered undoubtedly deeper. However, to what extent is it “silly” to be responsible for a nonbiological but socially established vulgarization? How silly is it not to be free to choose how to represent our body? How silly is it to tolerate as normal the fact that female breast has to be only accepted within two socially approved (but not too much, to be honest) mitigating circumstances: maternal breasts and sick breasts.

Free the Nipple is a really serious and seasoned movement against female nipple censorship. How is it fighting taboos? In a funny way, highlighting the hypocrisy related to female bodies and the “de-sexualization” that makes an otherwise outrageous breast picture acceptable.

Of course, it is not only originated as an offline struggling movement, since it also disputes the bizarre censorship episodes on social media, like Facebook and Instagram that prohibit to post pictures where female nipples are visible.

And do you know why are the nipples censored on social media? To ensure a safe navigation to their users!

How a couple of nipples can compromise users safety remains to be understood, but this is a fact: dear women, your nipples are a threat to public safety! It doesn’t matter that content promoting body shaming or relating to unsafe or unhealthy habits are still accepted, and such content makes Facebook or Instagram inconsistent with the claims contained in their guidelines.

I quote verbatim: “the safest possible place for teens and adults”!

Boobs are only admitted with justification: if you use them to feed your child or to build awareness around cancer, you’re free to go.

Otherwise, BAN! I’m leaving you with two open questions and a page to visit: 1) Is there only one right way to live?

2) When are you really free?

The page, instead, is @genderless_ nipples, an Instagram profile that posts pictures of nipples with no gender distinction or, better, showing how difficult is it to distinguish between a male and a female nipple, “equaling” both genders as a matter of fact.

The bio says it all about this project: “Men are allowed to show their nipples, women’s get banned. Support ALL genders! Let’s change this policy!”

Adele Loguasto is a copywriting expert.

Born in Sicily and out of the comfort zone by her own choice, she wanders with a keyboard, irony and curiosity as her sole weapons.

Adele is currently working as Social Media Manager and Digital Strategist for AlterErgo Factory (Caltanissetta).

drawing by Elisa Ricci @riccielise_

Nelken

by MAYA GEIER model ARIANNA DIFRANCESCO fashion designers ALONA TZALIK, SHIRLY LASRY, MAAYAN LEVI MEIR wardrobe stylist ALONA TZALIK make-up artists & hair RONA-LEE, EVEN-CHEN

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soft bra and skirt PETIT POIS

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leotard PETIT POIS

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dress MAAYAN LEVI MEIR

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dress ZARA bow STYLIST’S OWN

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Der Aesthetik

by MAURIZIO MONTANI designer FEDERICO ARAGRANDE product consultant MARIANNE CANCRINI stylist NOSTRASANTISSIMA, QUARANTA SETTE

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Once upon a time

by MARRI IATSENKO model XENIA MOSS wardrobe stylist DIANA IATSENKO make-up artist MARIA MZHELSKAYA videomaker & retoucher MARRI IATSENKO

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clothing SOEASY.MOSCOW

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Summer Break

by ELLEN SIMONE model JOHANNA W. @STOCKHOLMSGRUPPEN make-up artist JASMINE LUNDMARK hair stylist KIMIA HAGHIGHI

gloves Ã…HLENS hairpins H&M sunglasses VINTAGE

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blazer ACNE hairpins KICKS

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shirt MONKI hairpins KICKS

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earrings WOS

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earrings &OTHER STORIES swimsuit H&M sunglasses VINTAGE

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Lightness

by GRETA BARTUCCIO model JULIA SPODNIEWSKA wardrobe stylist EMANUELA BERTINO make-up artist ESMERALDA KOUIRA

hairband, dangling earrings and bracelet DANIMA dress CETTINA BUCCA

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hairband, dangling earrings and bracelet DANIMA top and pants CETTINA BUCCA

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hairband, dangling earrings and bracelet DANIMA top and pants ASCIARI MILANO

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hairband, dangling earrings and bracelet DANIMA dress ASCIARI MILANO

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interview

by Gaetano Pavano

Victoria Emslie Victoria Emslie is a British Actress with a Masters in Arabic and French from University of St. Andrews. She graduated from RCSSD and is known for The Theory of Everything (2014), Downton Abbey (2015) and 12 Monkeys (2018). She is an active member of Time’s Up UK and core committee member of ERA 5050.

photo by FRANCINE KARAGOZIAN

and ate my lunches lying diagonally; 4. and a massive curly wig that was just, well, massive and 5. an earpiece to pipe in music whilst I worked through a stylised routine we’d choreographed, whilst standing propped up on a podium in front of 100 people in a room lit with hundreds of candles for ten hours. Loved every second of it but definitely not your average day at work. Shooting Syfy’s 12 Monkeys in Prague was incredible too. Wonderful location, wonderful team. It was a dream to be able to use my French for some of the scenes and I was running around in a maid’s outfit trying to assassinate Hitler. I’m not going to lie, I felt pretty badass. In conjunction with work, these last few years have been incredible for meeting like-minded people; the industry is starting to wake up to many of its systemic problems and entrenched biases which means we are all working together a lot more closely to bring about the lasting change needed. I have such admiration for all the wonderful women I’m working with at the moment, especially at ERA 5050 and Time’s Up UK. You are often on the move around the world. Is it only for work or do you also travel for leisure?

photo by CAT LANE

Ciao Victoria, it’s a pleasure to see you again on La Plus Belle. It’s been a while since the last interview.

How are you? Please, tell us about you and the work you’ve done in the last years.

Really well thank you, it’s great to catch up; I’ve missed my LPB family! The last few years have been a whirlwind.

A lot of time has been spent travelling, playing some weird and wonderful characters and making some pretty incredible, incredibly-mundane Halloween costumes. One of my favourite roles was playing an Automaton for ITV’s The Frankenstein Chronicles. I had to have a full body cast taken to create exact replicas of my hands, face and body. Never underestimate how disturbing it is to hold your dismembered head in your own hands. The role was unusual for many reasons: I spent the wee hours of the morning getting prosthetics glued to my body and then my stomach was painted green (in post production they edited my legs out and replaced my insides with cogs); 2.

I wore whole eyeball-encompassing hand-painted contact lenses to make me look like a doll which meant I could only see what was directly in front of me; 3. I had the largest, tightly-corseted handmade dress known to man or woman

One of the best things about certain jobs is that if you are lucky you do get to travel at the same time. In the past 8 months I’ve been out to Cape Town and Argentina for work which have been some of my favourite places to date. But any excuse to travel and see the world I try to take, I’m very impulsive like that. If someone said, come and visit me in Athens, and I had the money to do it, I would book a flight then and there (that did happen recently). My sister actually introduced me to a great app a couple of days ago called Been. You just enter all the countries you’ve visited and they show up on a world map so you can see where you’ve been and where you could go next. Turns out I’ve visited 20% of the countries in the world. More than I thought! Let’s hope I live until 150 to get the others in or just blast through them on a mad road trip (without the bats). I’ve always wanted to do that.

Are you satisfied with your life in general and with your working life?

Work life is wild. There was a point for a couple of weeks that I was working 20 hour days so I’m glad that period is now over. If I’m honest, I’m still working on refining my work-life balance at the moment; luckily a few bottles and some supportive friends help with that. I’ve just got off a feature which was really fun to shoot as I knew a lot of the people who were working on it. Seeing familiar faces on set is always a blast. I guess the big work news would be that I recently launched a new business to address the gender balance within my Industry. People are starting to collate data which gives us a pretty stark picture of the Industry as a whole which makes it much harder to put up

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a fight against conversations around inclusivity.

Currently men outnumber women 2:1 onscreen and sometimes up to 3:1 and you are actually more likely to see an alien than an Asian woman. Mind-blowing, I know. As an actor, I know that to change the conversation onscreen we need to change the conversation behind the screen, and that is why I founded my new business. Primetime is a centralised global database of all the women working above and below the line behind the camera in the Entertainment Industry so there can no longer be the excuse of, “Where are all the women?”

We went global very quickly after going live at Cannes Film Festival this year and now have over 1000 members worldwide, including multi-BAFTA and Emmy winners and our first Oscar-nominated Director. We have partnered with some brilliant organisations, such as Spot, an AI discrimination and harassment bot to help keep our members safe in their workplaces. Lots of exciting news to announce soon so *plug alert* keep an eye on our social media: Instagram - @primetime.network and Twitter - @ PrimetimeNetwrk.

I must admit, I get so much satisfaction from this new project and connecting with others who are doing brilliant work. I hope to look back in twenty/thirty years and say, “yes, I was a part of changing that conversation.”

Very interesting! Please, tell us more about your new “Primetime” project, and how can we join?

Perhaps I shouldn’t have spilt all the beans earlier on, but I could honestly talk about it for hours so buckle up. The idea for it came from a call to action from leaders in the Entertainment Industry during a Time’s Up UK meeting, a group of which I’m a core member. There has been a lot of talk and now it is the time for action; Primetime is a simple tool to help employers and HODs look at their hiring practices. We have two different types of membership and require a certain number of credits to join. Both individuals and companies are vetted by the team but once on the site can find and contact each other for free. We are endorsed by Time’s Up UK, The Geena Davis Institute, ERA 5050, Collectif 5050 with many Guilds, Societies and Agencies coming onboard and encouraging their members and clients to sign up. If there are any grades or countries missing from the site let us know and we’ll add them straight away. You can join us at www.primetime.network.

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Following you on social media, we noticed you are an “extreme” sports enthusiast participating in events around the world. As far as I remember some of the activities you were part of had charity purposes. Can you tell us more?

Haha I’m sure if you were to ask someone who does extreme sports whether they thought what I do was extreme you might get a raised eyebrow or two. In the last couple of years, following a series of chance encounters with rough sleepers, I’ve become an Ambassador for St. Mungos who work tirelessly to help end homelessness and whose clients are at the heart of all the decisions that get made. I ran the Hackney Half to raise money for them, then a couple of weeks later did a double back-to-back marathon camping overnight in between. That was pretty wild. Could I walk for a month afterwards? No, I could not. Was it something I ever thought I could do? Never. But miraculously I have some photos and medals to show for it. I think discovered something very fundamental about myself: bait almost any physical activity with a medal at the end and I’ll probably give it a go - must be the chance to reinvent my unsporty childhood. I also did the UK’s highest freefall abseil in London - the views were breathtaking across the city; it almost made you forget that you were dangling by a thin rope 262ft up in the air. Last year we also took a group of St. Mungos clients and scaled Scafell Pike. Being there when we all reached the top together was indescribable; there was such a sense of achievement and a physicalisation of an understanding that you can overcome almost any struggle and adversity in life as long as you put one foot in front of the other or roll with the punches. We are all climbing Ben Nevis in September.

Can you give our readers – and us – some sneak peeks about your upcoming commitments as an actress? No spoilers, please!

There’s a feature project that will get underway next year that I’m incredibly excited about as again I’m working with brilliant people and exploring a character who I’ve always wanted to play… (you did say no spoilers!) I’m also working on an audio anthology about women’s choices not to have children and the stigmas attached to that.

Before we say goodbye, may I ask you when are you coming back to Sicily to visit us?

Good luck with everything and see you soon.

Prestissimo! Grazie mille e un bacione a tutti

photo by AIDAN MONAGHAN

(follow Victoria Emslie on Instagram: @monhublot)

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Cosmic Love

by FRANCESCO LEMBO model MARTINA DI VAIO @FREEMODELS AGENCY NAPLES jewelry designer GANESHA JEWELS make-up artist GIUSY UCCIERO thanks to LA BELLE EPOQUE MONDRAGONE

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Of Honor

by ALESSANDRO GALATOLI model SARA MUN designer & stylist YEVGENIYA RUDYK make-up & hair DYLAN TIMPERANZA assistant photographer DANIELE FEDERICI studio & equipment SIMONE MALATESTA, ASSOCIAZIONE AUREA

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Obsession by past

by SERGEY FREE model KATRIN KAUROV @MAJOR MODELS MILAN stylist KRISTINA GALANTS make-up & hair IVAN MOOMIN

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The Bored Princess

by EMMANUEL VIVIER model ABIGAIL TARA LILLY KENT fashion stylist BELINDA CHORLEY make-up artist LUCY MCKEOWN hair stylist MATLA KAROLINA producer & photography advisor BRUCE SMITH retoucher EMMANUEL VIVIER

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asymmetric porcelain dress BEYOND BRIDAL jewelry GLAMUNIQUE 122 LAPLUSBE L L E

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dress in nude silk satin BEYOND BRIDAL embroidered tulle veil BEYOND BRIDAL LAPLU S BELLE 1 25

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blouse corset and skirt BEYOND BURLESQUE jewelry JACQ BRILL shoes MODEL’S OWN LAPLU S BELLE 1 27

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Jumanji

by ELISA BONAFÈ model CHIOMA @ESPIRIT MANAGEMENT fashion stylist MASSIMILIANO FILIPPELLI stylist assistant FRANCESCA FONTANA make-up & hair SARA DE BLASI

suits WEILI ZHENG earrings ZARA

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suits WEILI ZHENG earrings ZARA

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dress NANUSHKA earrings ZARA

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shirt and trousers FEDERICA LANARI earrings ZARA

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trench and dress WEILI ZHENG earrings and shoes ZARA

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shirt 3.1 PHILLIP LIM trousers STAUD earrings ZARA

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dress FEDERICA LANARI earrings ZARA

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About Flower An Illusion

by GLORIA ORTENZI model KATERINA KARPOVA @THE WOLVES MODEL MANAGEMENT stylist CARLA DALÈ make-up artist NATALIA BENJELLOUN

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top and trousers ANDREA CONSALVO headband TATY HANDMADE

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dress ZARA skirt ELISABETTA FRANCHI shoes STYLIST’S OWN LAPLU S BELLE 1 43

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dress CHIARA CARMELI

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advertise with us download our media kit

Download our complete media kit for detailed information and pricing. www.laplusbelle.it/media-kit

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