Louis Vuitton Pic Of Ronaldo & Messi By Annie Leibovitz Is More Than Meets Eye
Checkmate. Annie Leibovitz has set the internet ablaze with her latest project, bringing together soccer legends Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi in front of her lens for a Louis Vuitton campaign.
The image, which depicts two of the world’s most famous athletes attentively playing a game of chess atop a Louis Vuitton bag, has gathered over 66 million likes across the trio’s accounts on Instagram.
As PetaPixel points out, the most-liked post on the platform is a picture of an egg with nearly 56 million likes. Ronaldo’s 37 million hearts, along with Messi’s 29 million, are catching up, with the former already in the second spot despite being posted just two days ago.
Here’s some unfortunate news for fans who are digging the union, however: The two soccer stars weren’t actually seated together in the same room for the pictorial. It appears they had posed separately, before being composited together in post-production.
The box under… 🧠pic.twitter.com/DSHRbB2Wa9
— TC (@totalcristiano) November 19, 2022
Nonetheless, the photograph is still on its way to breaking records, boosted by the focus on the sport as the world has its eyes on the 2022 Qatar World Cup. The Olympics committee credits the duo’s rivalry for the photo’s virality, as it’s indeed a rare occurrence to see both greats in a single frame.
Interestingly, eagle-eyed fans have theories surrounding the bag on which the game of chess is being played. Resembling the briefcase that housed the FIFA World Cup trophy back in Russia four years ago, some think the similar trunk symbolically represents the continuing battle.
In addition, chess enthusiasts have spotted that the positions of the pieces in the picture mirror those of a real game played by grandmasters Magnus Carlsen and Hikaru Nakamura in 2017, though it remains uncertain why that particular game was chosen as a reference.
Could the pair possibly pair up for more collaborations in the future? Fingers crossed, the next time they’ll actually appear alongside each other.
So the Louis Vuitton photoshoot with Messi/Ronaldo features a game between Magnus and Hikaru from 2017. But… why specifically that one? pic.twitter.com/ETRWaawtra
— GothamChess (@GothamChess) November 20, 2022
[via PetaPixel and Olympics, cover image via Annie Leibovitz / Louis Vuitton]
