Director's Works
Hardeman, Love & Romance Emma Westenberg
Dutch director Emma Westenberg’s distinctly pop aesthetic comes from her confident mix of classic visual tropes, fashion, and fine art influences. Emma’s strength lies in creating unique worlds and collaborating with other artists such as Troye Sivan and Janelle Monae. Her first feature film, BLEEDING LOVE, starring Ewan McGregor, premiered at SXSW in 2023.
Los Angeles is known as a city of cars. But if you so choose to wander its sidewalks, you’re sure to find a whole world of characters: roadside philosophers, paranoid journalists, big eyed dreamers and Hollywood Boulevard’s very own Elmos and Elsas ready to charge you 20 bucks for a picture. The always curious minds at Hardeman chose to explore those surreal streets, and tapped photographer Maylisa Daniels and director and photographer Lauren Schiller to do so.
The two interviewed LA’s inhabitants about the cosmic and conspiratorial while draped in garments from the Amsterdam-based brand. Reporting live from an anchor’s desk set up in a SoCal Wendy’s, the video toggles between Schiller and Daniels’ "newsroom" and Los Angeles’s chaotic, sunny streets. The Hardeman garments they’re wearing pop with bold prints, patchwork denim and frills of fur, making them walking displays of the brand’s forward thinking workwear. The video, which was directed by frequent Hardeman collaborator Emma Westenberg, mirrors the eclectic clothes’ energy with cinematography that is equally, deliciously frenetic.
Hardeman’s piece of gonzo journalism is live, exclusively on PAPER.
