Dolce & Gabbana Get Stabby in a New Ad Campaign

The Advertising Standards Authority said the company acted irresponsibly and breached standards of good taste in publishing the ads, which showed male models waving knives while surrounded by glamorous women models, in poses inspired by the paintings of French romantic artist Eugene Delacroix. One man was shown lying on the ground with a gunshot wound to the head.

The ruling amounts to a slap on the wrist and doesn’t ban the ads.

It upheld complaints that Dolce & Gabbana had shirked its social responsibility and breached standards of decency. But it dismissed a complaint that the ads would encourage people to harm themselves.

Dolce & Gabbana says the ads were printed around the globe but the only complaints had come from people in Britain. The company argues the ads were “highly stylized and intended to be an iconic representation of the Napoleonic period of art.”

The Advertising Standards Authority noted that while the ads were highly stylized, “the knives were brandished aggressively and the image of a man lying on the ground with a wound to his forehead added to the overall impression of violence.”

“We considered that the ad could be seen as condoning and glorifying knife-related violence and concluded that it was irresponsible.”

Surprisingly, the ads surprisingly received no criticism when they ran in the U.S.

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