Ten Reasons to Buy AnOther Magazine Autumn/Winter 2022

“Our obsessions are the actors, musicians, artists and fashion designers who fight against the pedestrian and who take risks even though that may attract outrage,” writes editor-in-chief Susannah Frankel of the figures who fill the pages of AnOther Magazine’s Autumn/Winter 2022 issue. Here are just a few highlights from an issue celebrating passionate, obsessive spirits who dare to swim against the tide – the obsessed, the possessed.

1. Ana de Armas is electrifying in her portrayal of Marilyn Monroe in the visceral screen adaptation of Joyce Carol Oates’ novel Blonde. “It’s unapologetic and brave and feminist,” the fearless Cuban-born actor tells Hannah Lack in New York, divulging her personal obsession with Monroe and a knotty relationship with fame – both Marilyn’s, and her own. For AnOther’s cover, de Armas transforms into a pinup in her own right, photographed by Craig McDean and styled by Katie Shillingford. 

2. “I stand for individuality,” says Compton-born musical prodigy Steve Lacy in a freewheeling conversation with Ted Stansfield about legacy, love, art in the algorithm and his latest album, Gemini Rights. A kaleidoscopic portfolio captures Lacy’s many-sided persona, photographed by Joshua Woods and styled by Ellie Grace Cumming.

3. To mark her tenth album Fossora, shape-shifting avant-pop icon Björk speaks to acclaimed author and poet Ocean Vuong in a candid and moving conversation about life, death and mothering. Björk is photographed in all her majestic glory by Nick Knight and dressed by Alessandro Michele of Gucci. “One very beautiful thing that happens when you get to my age is … your mind starts throwing away all the shit that doesn’t matter,” she says. 

4. “I need freedom to be myself,” says fashion’s ultimate disruptor Rei Kawakubo of Comme des Garçons in a rare interview with Susannah Frankel, while her latest collection, inspired by the black rose – to Kawakubo, a symbol of freedom – is photographed by Harley Weir and styled by Robbie Spencer.

5. The uncompromising John Galliano returned to the stage for his Autumn/Winter 2022 Maison Margiela Artisanal collection: literally, via a theatrical production written by the designer himself and realised in collaboration with theatre company Imitating the Dog. The result? The show of season, a dark romance featuring a spectacular cast of muses matched by the power and grace of the clothing on show. The rehearsals are captured by Willy Vanderperre and styled by Olivier Rizzo alongside a revealing interview in which Galliano shares the layers of meaning behind his theatrical extravaganza. “It comes from the heart,” he says.

6. Immerse yourself in Valentino Pink PP – a particular hue of pink invented by designer Pierpaolo Piccioli, shot by Nadine Ijewere and styled by Katie Shillingford. Alexander Fury speaks with the Italian couturier in the Valentino salons in Paris and Rome about creativity, strength and reinventing Valentino for the trials and tribulations of the 21st century. “Hope and creativity are the only things we have to destroy the darkness of the moment,” he says.

7. Discover a trio of subversive visions challenging fashion’s status quo: cult New York label Vaquera, insurgent British designer SS Daley and Hunrod, Michèle Lamy and Lori Rodkin’s talismanic jewellery brand, all photographed by Marton Perlaki and styled by Chloe Grace Press.

8. The obsessions of the Autumn/Winter season are captured by some of the world’s most innovative image-makers and fashion talent – including Alasdair McLellan and Marie Chaix, Philip-Daniel Ducasse and Nell Kalonji, Hanna Moon and Agata Belcen, Marili Andre and Emma Wyman, Theo De Gueltzl and Raphael Hirsch, Thue Norgaard and Katie Shillingford, Kristin-Lee Moolman and Ellie Grace Cumming.

9. Trailblazing dancer and choreographer Wayne McGregor takes us inside the hidden creative processes of the dance world’s most celebrated practitioners in this special guest-edit of Document, which features personal notebooks, sketches, scribbles and moodboards. “For decades I’ve been fascinated by the note-taking of dance-makers, their very private and idiosyncratic conversations with themselves,” he says. “Choreographers’ notebooks are intimate windows into the working soul of the dance-maker.”

10. AnOther Magazine’s Art Project showcases the audacious, playful and sometimes gross-out work of Tehran-born, LA-based artist Tala Madani, taken from her first major survey show at MOCA this autumn. An illuminating kitchen-table conversation with her husband, artist Nathaniel Mellors, spans the pleasures of unpalatable art and the messaging of Stranger Things. “I’m trying to articulate something apart and aside from the western or dominant cultural identifiers of the female,” she says, of work worthy of obsession.

The Autumn/Winter 2022 issue of AnOther Magazine is on sale internationally now. Buy a copy here.