Dolce & Gabbana was just hours away from welcoming guests to a huge fashion show in China. Now, amid accusations of racism, the event has been postponed, according to the luxury brand’s official Weibo account.
The fashion house has found itself embroiled in controversy over a series of videos released on social media. By the time the postponement was announced, a number of celebrity invitees had already said they would not be attending the show, which was due to take place in Shanghai Wednesday evening.
Three 40-second spots, aired on the Italian brand’s Instagram, Facebook and Twitter profiles, as well as its Weibo account in China, show an Asian model struggling to eat Italian food with chopsticks. The videos were created to promote “The Great Show,” which is billed by the fashion house as a “tribute to China.”
The first “episode,” published Sunday, features a model in a sequined red dress attempting to eat an entire pizza. She prods the pizza with chopsticks to the sound of stereotypical Chinese music, before a narrator offers seemingly patronizing advice such as “don’t attempt to use the chopsticks as knives” and “just use your chopsticks like pliers.”
In the second and third episodes, the same model attempts to eat a cannoli and a bowl of spaghetti. The narrator seems to mispronounce the brand’s name, with some interpreting this as mocking the way Chinese people say “Dolce & Gabbana.”
What was, perhaps, an innocent attempt to play on Chinese culture has infuriated some social media users. The topic was trending on Weibo hours before the show was due to start.
Social media outcry was further exacerbated by a screen capture of racist comments alleged to have been made by D&G co-founder, Stefano Gabbana, in a direct message on Instagram. Both Gabbana and the luxury brand have since posted messages saying that their accounts had been hacked, with the Italian designer pasting the words “not me” over images of the alleged exchange.
Source: CNN
