Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1433300
48 • THE ARTISAN WINTER 2022 What kind of research did you do when you signed on for the project? Did you draw from personal memories/ experiences? My research was mainly based on my artistic knowledge of the 18th century, an extraordinary period. There is, among other things, a huge film catalog to be inspired by. I visited art galleries to have a better awareness of colours, considering that the colours used by painters in the 18th century were the same as those that aristocrats used for make-up, in the sense that the whites and reds were the same which were used to paint the canvases and to make up faces. This is an incredible fact for me to be able to have the precise chromatic knowledge of the colours used by aristocrats, I am obsessed with colours! I continued my research looking for texts and found valuable documents describing the techniques used during that time period. Research allowed me to delve deeply into the 18th century and gave me understanding of the complexities. It was socially more divisive than it may seem, meant to purposely divide society into three different parts: the aristocracy, the bourgeoisie, and the peasantry. A Q & A W I T H A L E S S A N D R O B E R T O L A Z Z I | D E P A R T M E N T H E A D M A K E U P Did director Joe Wright have specific looks in mind? Joe Wright is the ideal director to work with, a man full of knowl- edge, with an immense visual culture and always full of wonderful ideas that have stimulated me more and more every day. I have never nished thanking him for trusting me. What kind of reference images were helpful to you and your team? Were any past films used as inspiration? As I always say, art is the main source of inspiration for all my work, an immensely extraordinary source of inspiration. Also in this case more than ever art and a precious witness, but we must be careful. Pictorial art shows us only the beautiful part of the subjects. To explain myself better I would say embellished. No nobleman would have wanted to be portrayed with the skin devastated by smallpox or the sick and blackened teeth caused by the main ingredient lead material used for the white foundation we can say created a real monster, so the painter commissioned and paid by the clients, like a cosmetic surgeon, he had to transform the subject as best as possible. CYRANO BETWEEN ART AND IMAGINATION