More than a year ago, the undisputed star of our period settled in Paris. The author of deep and sensual works, director, screenwriter, actress is just the tip of the iceberg of Renata’s multi-personality and genius. Today she, like many who left Russia, once again starts everything from scratch. And the new story will be about happiness.

“I am now that nobody, but soon I will be extremely important for people who recognize me,” Renata began the story. “Either plus or minus, but indifference is unknown to me. I am nobody who will turn into something. Starting life anew, I feel young again, I discover everything again. But I got up this morning with the feeling that now I am the most surprised person in the world. I am amazed, I am in shock, I cannot recover from the events. But it is amazing that this does not make me the most evil, destroyed. I am surprised in every sense, but it didn’t break me, didn’t burn me.” 

For many years, Litvinova has been creating projects, consolidating all creative power in her fragile hands: scriptwriter, director, leading actress… “I wouldn’t have succeeded differently. Otherwise, I must submit to others, and their circle is very narrow. It is interesting for me to work exclusively with geniuses: Kira Muratova, Alexey Balabanov, Peter Greenaway, Rustam Khamdamov, Alexander Mitta, Zemfira. And if a person is not a genius, then it is not worth wasting time on him. The only thing Renata regrets is the impossibility of being torn apart and standing behind the camera and in the frame at the same time. It is more convenient for her to make the product herself, and only two people, reliable friends, whose work Renata never checks and does not doubt the genius of the result, are the musician Zemfira Ramazanova and the creative director of Balenciaga Demna Gvasalia. It was Gvasalia who designed the dresses for the play “Cactus”, which since the beginning of the year has been seen by the audience in Paris, London and Limassol: “I told Demna: “First, the audience will need to recover from watching the dresses. Then they must hear what the play is about. Then they should listen to Zemfira’s music and understand the meaning of the song, then we have a video sequence. The poor viewer is doomed to consume a lot of information. This performance is, in a sense, work on yourself when you consume this concentrate of art inside. Work on the play had begun before the war. A story about the beginning of love and parting with it, which is a drama for every person, the description of which Renata succeeds like no other of his contemporaries: “Your pain is always an inspiration. But when you’re happy, you won’t write. On the other hand, this is also happiness – to melt your misfortune into happiness. Love for me is something bloody. Does happy life exist? Maybe it does for some people. I haven’t met.”

Renata Litvinova is a landmark actress and director of modern arthouse cinema, she accepts her intimacy and niche, sharing her work with millions of viewers and readers: “Women are strangely inspired and at the same time want to appropriate a part of me for themselves, at the same time compete and at the same time be the same as me. But there are amazing intellectuals, aesthetes. And there is a part of the public that exudes great skepticism towards strong women in art – especially from men.”

Renata is a recognized style icon and a standard of female beauty. For the past five years, she has been Demna’s friend and muse, dressed in his extraordinary dresses: “Demna is such a size, a person of high quality! A brilliant artist, he canceled everything old in fashion and launched everything new, made a kind of revolution. Nothing suits me but his dresses. Here I have one, a second, a third, and I need 150 more of his dresses. Now Demna is creating a secret dress for me, I can’t reveal all the secrets yet, but I’ll tell you what it is. Remember Princess Diana had a dress of vengeance when she was able to get revenge on Charles without a single word? Such a wow dress, no matter what, in spite of everything. I will have a completely different wow dress, but the creative task is solved.” 

Transforming forced emigration into creative expansion, Renata notes that here, in France, oddly enough, there is more work and freedom: “Maybe when I have some kind of seventh life, like cats, I will calm down and move to the rank of just writer. And as my grandmother predicted to me, I will achieve my main success when I write one big book. Maybe I’ll describe my life. Believe me, there will be many chapters!” 

At the end of the conversation, I am interested in what is most difficult: “When everything is difficult, let’s choose one everyday moment and focus on practical difficulties. I need to learn French now. I read somewhere: “And suddenly she was struck by lightning, and she spoke the purest French!” I’m willing to be struck by lightning for this.”

Aleksey Nilov

PHOTOGRAPH AND ART DIRECTOR
Eseniya Araslanova
@eseniyaa

PHOTO ASSISTANT
Anton Grebentsov
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STYLING
Jamie-MareeShipton
@airtomyearth

STYLE ASSISTANT
Malou Beaumont et Yasmine Abbas
@maloubeaumont
@badgalyaas

SET DESIGN AND FLORAL DA
CENTÁ
@centa_project

MUA
Irina Grishina
@irinag_makeup_artist

HAIRSTYLE
Evgeny Zubov
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INTERVIEW
Alexey Nilov
@niloveditor

BACKSTAGE
Nikita Cherniy
@n212yc

PROJECT INITIATIVE AND PRODUCTION
Le GlowProject
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By @Mynoanna