Joanna Hogg and Alice Diop have been tapped as the next filmmakers in the Miu Miu Women’s Tales series, the fashion house’s ongoing short film program spotlighting women directors at the Venice Film Festival.
Hogg, the British filmmaker behind “The Eternal Daughter” starring Tilda Swinton, and Diop, the French documentarian whose “Saint Omer” won two major prizes at Venice in 2022, will debut their new shorts on Aug. 30 as part of the Giornate degli Autori sidebar. Screenings will take place at the Sala Perla at the Palazzo del Casinò.
Hogg’s contribution, “Autobiography of a Handbag,” is a 24-minute film structured around the journey of a Miu Miu Wander bag as it passes through a range of owners and settings — from teenagers of privilege to the urban margins. The story moves across Italian factories, villas and city outskirts to sketch a portrait of contemporary Italy through objects and their custodians.
Diop’s film, “Fragments for Venus,” runs 21 minutes and looks at the representation of the Black female body in the history of art. The short draws inspiration from Robin Coste Lewis’ 2015 poem “Voyage of the Sable Venus,” which assembled and recontextualized centuries of artistic depictions of Black women.
Since its launch in 2012, Miu Miu’s Women’s Tales has asked two women auteurs each year to create original short films timed to Venice. Over the past decade, the program has drawn a wide cross-section of voices from both cinema and the art world.
Previous participants range from Oscar-nominated auteurs like Ava DuVernay and Lynne Ramsay, to global festival fixtures such as Naomi Kawase and Mati Diop, as well as performers-turned-directors including Chloë Sevigny and Dakota Fanning. The late Agnès Varda also contributed a short, marking one of her final works.
As in past years, the screenings will be followed by a series of public conversations hosted by Giornate and the Veneto Film Commission. Moderated by The Gentlewoman editor-in-chief Penny Martin, the 2025 talks will run Aug. 31–Sept. 1 at the Hotel Excelsior.
Diop and Hogg will sit down for a conversation about storytelling that crosses genres and formats. Emma Corrin is paired with Maggie Gyllenhaal for a discussion on how artists reinterpret classic material. A final session brings together Myha’la, Alisha Boe and Sarah Catherine Hook, focusing on the challenges of shaping characters for serialized television.
The Women’s Tales program is backed by Miu Miu as creative partner of Giornate degli Autori. Since its launch, the initiative has has grown into a regular marker on the Venice calendar, distinct for centering women directors within the framework of a major European festival.