Feature: The Circle by Camila Falquez

Two photos from our Air Max 97 shoot: a dancer in white holding two hoops, and a dancer in white standing beside a rope laid in a circle on a concrete floor. A dancer in white crouching low beside an orange rope circle, wearing grey Nike Air Max 97s, in a bare concrete warehouse. Two photos: a group of dancers leaning back in a circle in a warehouse, and two women standing in front of ochre, white and magenta drapes. Two photos: a woman in an ochre headwrap and red socks sitting on draped fabric in grey Air Max 97s, and dancers moving across a warehouse floor. Two photos: dancers clustered together mid-movement, and a woman in a red swimsuit sitting on fabric holding a white ball, wearing black trainers.

In August 2017 we worked with the photographer and filmmaker Camila Falquez on a film and shoot for the Nike Air Max 97. The shoe was turning 20 and Nike was bringing it back, and we wanted to show it in a way nobody would have pictured in 1997: on nine dancers in Barcelona, moving together.

The idea behind The Circle

It started with the circle itself. In Camila's words: "It's a conceptual interpretation of diversity and womanhood and about how we are all related and equal in our core. The circle is, in geometry, the perfect form, it's the most efficient shape of all, it represents humanity." The dancers came from all kinds of backgrounds, and the film follows them working, dancing and moving as one group.

Who is Camila Falquez?

Camila was born in Mexico City to Colombian parents, grew up in Barcelona and is based in New York. She was obsessed with dance from a young age, ballerinas especially, and that interest in how bodies move runs through her photography. Of her work, she says: "Noticing, as I developed my art, that race, gender, nationality and age divide us socially, I became determined to express through my images that we are all just bodies, flesh and bones. I try to bring people, culture and politics to the very basic: Humanity."

We'd followed her work for a long time before we asked her. Since the shoot, her photographs have gone into the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Pérez Art Museum Miami.

The film

i-D covered the film when it came out, alongside an interview with our founders about why they started a sneaker store just for women. You can read the i-D interview online.

Credits

Photography: Camila Falquez
Video direction: Camila Falquez
Creative direction: Camila Falquez
Director of photography: Fran Rios
Second unit, New York: Alejandro Mejia
Set design assistant: Mayte Esteban
Styling: Ahida Aguirre
Make-up: Gloria Ricoo
Gaffer: Dani Martin
Focus: Franki A. Ronda
Steel drum: Elisabeth Fidel
Dancers: Ines Costa, Esther Pou, Hanna Tervonen, Zarina Rondon, Agatha Ferrando, Africa N Gozalez Vigil, Wanessa Tayler, Ines Archer and Najwa Charki Mahamsani
Location: Utopia 126, Barcelona

The Air Max 97s in these photos sold out a long time ago. For more on where Air Max came from, read what Nike visible Air is, or see what's in our footwear now.

Back to blog