01/04/2015

Culottes: Love and Hate Between Comfort and Flair

It might seem obvious, but everything that is presented as a trend doesn’t necessarily need to be embraced as a fashion necessity. On the subject of culottes, which have been spotted on the Spring/Summer runways both this season as well as the previous one, we can safely say that it’s one of those trends which are heatedly debated between Cinderella and Emperor’s new clothes camps.

Culottes were initially designed as high-class French leg-wear and their highly iconic status can be reflected in the fact that the revolutionaries who stormed the Bastille were known as sans culottes. Feminine culottes were created as a result of ladies becoming more active in the Victorian era. Even though the legs division was concealed in different ways, the garment provided women with freedom to ride both bikes and horses properly, their practicality mirroring a feminist standpoint. Elsa Schiaparelli was an early adopter of the kind of culottes you’ll find on the streets this season, definitely reminiscent of those from the 1970s.

Despite the comeback of the 1990s and the expectance of the micro-mini revival á la “Clueless”, the length most fashionistas are adopting is the middle ground – midi. As a consequence the culottes’ return to the runway is not a surprise, combining the sporty comfort with feminine grace without a hassle. This season’s interpretations were designed to fit each personality, with structured or loose fit cuts, colorful or somber patterns, with Chanel, Céline, Tibi and Stella McCartney among the fashion houses embracing the piece. Comfort has been increasingly in demand in contemporary fashion. With a growing appropriation of sporty influences, the notion of comfort has become central to design processes, where the desires and needs of individuals are the most significant guidelines of creative production, even when a historical piece like culottes is given new, original life.

Victoria Edman 
01/04/2015

Down The Long Driveway, You’ll See It

“Down The Long Driveway, You’ll See It” is a book of photographs of modernist New Zealand homes, developed by photographer Mary Gaudin. These houses aren’t new, they’re old and lived in. They can be a little dusty, slightly worn around the edges and all have what antique dealers like to call “patina”. But they’re perfect in the minds of the people who live in them because of what they represent, which when designed, was a better way of living.

The Blogazine 
31/03/2015

Daily Tips: Ed Ruscha at Gagosian in Paris

“Prints and Photographs” and “Books & Co.” are two exhibitions organized by Gagosian Paris that survey the world of Ed Ruscha: his prints of the past forty years, together with rarely seen photographs produced since 1959, as well as his legendary artist’s books, together with those of more than 70 contemporary artists from all over the world, providing an in-depth examination of the unrestricted gestures that fuel his assiduous art. Ranging freely and dexterously across traditional, unconventional, or sometimes even comestible materials, Ruscha’s prints are a fluid forum for the spirited investigation of what a limited-edition artwork can be. His absorption and re-thinking of the requirements of each graphic procedure and format result in step-by-step transformations, a process that echoes the eternal return of the subjects that make up his broader oeuvre. His artist’s books, on the other hand, were inspired by the unassuming books that he found in street stalls during a trip to Europe. In 1962 Ruscha published his first artist book, Twentysix Gasoline Stations under his own imprint, National Excelsior Press. A slim, cheaply produced volume, then priced at $3.50, Twentysix Gasoline Stations is exactly what its title suggests: twenty-six photographs of gas stations with captions indicating their brand and location, just like works of art. Ruscha followed this up with a succession of similarly self-evident and deadpan books, including Some Los Angeles Apartments (1965), Nine Swimming Pools and a Broken Glass (1968), and Real Estate Opportunities (1970), all of which combined the literalness of early California pop art with a photographic aesthetic informed by minimalist sequence and seriality, shot through with a wry sense of humor.

The Blogazine 
30/03/2015

Style Suggestions: Military

It’s time to step in line as military style hits the runways. With khaki and camouflage prints dominating the trends, hop on it, too, and let this look infiltrate your wardrobe.

Dress: Marc by Marc Jacobs, Jacket: Saint Laurent, Boots: Rick Owens, Backpack: Mulberry, Sunglasses: Prada, Jewelry: Atelier VM

Styling by Vanessa Cocchiaro 

30/03/2015

Boomerang: Pascale Marthine Tayou

As you enter the Serpentine Sackler Gallery, you are taken over by an accumulation of objects, assembled from a diversity of materials, found elements and visual icons. This aesthetic of abundance and aggregation is characteristic of Pascale Marthine Tayou’s work, through which he questions power, status and inequality in today’s world.

Born in Cameroon in 1966, currently living and working between Ghent in Belgium and Yaoundé in Cameroon, Pascal Marthine Tayou is a self-taught artists, who approached the art world after studying law. Tayou began exhibiting in the early 1990s – a time of political and social upheaval across West Africa, with works often produced in situ, renowned for combining found and discarded objects and materials – often sourced locally – with a skilled and playful sense of craftsmanship.

The show at Serpentine Galleries, titled “Boomerang” is Tayou’s first solo show in London. The exhibition includes new work made specifically for the Serpentine and introduces audiences to a range of works that demonstrate the artist’s unique ability to combine issues of individual and national identity and global consumption. The gallery is populated by a diverse mix of sculptural forms that demonstrate Tayou’s unique visual language based on archetypes, made and found objects and traditional craft. Mysterious human forms and fantastical beasts – such as the 100 metre snake of Africonda – incorporate materials such as cloth, wood, plastic, glass, organic matter and consumer waste combined with an artisanal skill. The exhibition runs until the 17th of May 2015 at Serpentine Sackler Gallery in London.

Rujana Rebernjak – Images courtesy of the Serpentine Galleries 
27/03/2015

“Presenze”, Transitional Objects on Show

One hundred objects crowd a black platform put diagonally in the middle of a room. Their heterogeneous nature is striking: form, function, scale, materials, geographical origin; they seem to have nothing in common. Some of them are famous design icons, others are cheap, mass-market products, while more than a few are old and anonymous. Others are weird: they are rare and incomprehensible, but they are far from being precious.

Among them we find a teddy bear. We read what its owner, the anonymous Giampiero T., has written about it: “Who knows if Donald Winnicott ever had a transitional object? It is said that he had a piece of blanket, a rag or perhaps a teddy bear like me. Who knows if this object was for him the connection with his mother and if it helped him to gently separate from his mother figure”. And thus we find a key to understand the very essence of “Presenze. Biografie inedite” [“Presences. Inedited Biographies”], the exhibition on show at Allestimenti Portanuova in Milan – just next to the construction site of the new Fondazione Prada – which gathers a selection of artefacts chosen by Milanese design protagonists, in order to showcase the favourite thing they keep at home.

Despite their identity, in fact, all the objects belong to the category of transitional objects. They reveal the emotional identity of their owner, and establish a vehicle, a sentimental transfer, with the rest of the world. At the same time, they transform themselves into a symbol, and promise to offer unconditional comfort when we are in troubles, or simply feel blue. A short text explains the history of each of these relationships, confirming once again how storytelling has become a powerful means to engage with the public. And it’s exactly this flowing narration, this form of collective stream of consciousness we may say, that suggests how design is more than ever “a state of mind”.

Giulia Zappa 
27/03/2015

The Fusion of Fashion and Architecture

The phenomenon of the fashion show has come a long way since it first was introduced as a tool for buyers to see the clothes on living mannequins. The shows then were low-key and intimate, the public a small crowd sitting close to the runway, far removed from the giant and global shows we see today. With the evolution of media and ever faster rhythms of our society, the importance of fashion shows has grown dramatically. The runway shows are no longer just tools for showing the latest collections, but have instead become a platform for designers to build broader concepts completing the theme of their collections, experiment with ideas as well as establish their brand through visual representation of a specific kind of lifestyle‪,‬ rather than relying just on plain clothes‪.‬

Kenzo and Prada are two examples of brands who used that tool with the aim of merge fashion, architecture and design‪,‬ in a union of creative disciplines and contemporary ways of life. Fashion has for a long period of time been seeking legitimacy through different art collaborations, with the purpose of being categorised as an art form and taken more seriously. However, fashion has also taken inspiration from architecture, a world of references which has grown more important especially since the set designs become a crucial part of the show. Prada has for example teamed up with highly established architect Rem Koolhas to create its set design, which had a clear architectural approach. Kenzo‪’‬s latest collection had its set design built around an architectural and design perspective and kicked off their show with six holographic pillars that moved forward forming a wall, and then rotated again to create a divider in the center of the catwalk.

But are there any deeper reasons for this monumental, architectural approach than just a search for legitimacy and growing spectacularisation of the fashion world? If big brands continue proposing such masterpieces, fusions of creative disciplines that famish after the spotlight is turned off, does that say more about how fashion world is changing? Are clothes in themselves not enough? And what about smaller brands that cannot by any means produce such scenographic effects? Can fashion ever return to itself and be just that, an art form of thoughtful expression through the apparently most transient means, clothes? Only future will tell.

Hanna Cronsjö 
26/03/2015

Daily Tips: A Piece of Temporary Architecture to Look Forward to

One of the most iconic landmarks in London during Summer is a temporary, fleeting piece of architecture: the Serpentine Galleries Pavilion has been delighting its visitors for the past fifteen years with constructions designed by some of the world’s most notable architects. Yet, for the past couple of years, the museum has decided to invite practitioners that do not easily fall within the ‘starchitect’ category. Therefore, this year’s commission was assigned to Spanish architects SelgasCano and this will be, according to the Serpentine’s rules, their first ever construction built in the UK. As the designs of the pavilion are unveiled, we know we can look forward to spending the warm months within an amorphous, double-skinned, polygonal structure consisting of panels of a translucent, multi-coloured fabric membrane woven through and wrapped in webbing. Visitors will be able to enter and exit the Pavilion at a number of different points, passing through a ‘secret corridor’ between the outer and inner layer of the structure and into the Pavilion’s brilliant, stained glass-effect interior. It looks like a very bright and appealing summer, indeed, even under cloudy London weather.

The Blogazine 
26/03/2015

YSL’s Liberation Collection, or the Current Value of Revival

The relationship fashion has with its past is quite complex. There are, indeed, many ways of using the past: it can either be a prison to flee away from or a temple to plunder for atmospheres, shapes, vibes. We are taught that, when past is the declared source of inspiration, we are talking about a ‘revival’. The dynamics of revival seem plain: revival means taking a period and rethinking it, reconsidering it with a different awareness, that of the present, and actually remaking its objects with the memory of the mould. Revival has to do with the strength of references, and a good dose of nostalgia. Right? Wrong. It is history of fashion that nostalgia has small to nothing to do with fashion’s fascination with the past. The first ‘revival’ collection was actually thought for people who ‘did not have memories’, and was developed by one of the designers whose name is related with avant-garde: Yves Saint Laurent.

In 1971, Yves Saint Laurent presented his ‘Liberation’ collection, also called ‘Forties’, for the evident reprise of themes and variations of the war years. The collection was defined ‘hideous’ by the press, because it was a ‘sad reminder’ of a period of restriction. France felt betrayed by the elected heir of the grand couturiers. Saint Laurent himself compared the clash he provoked with the ‘scandal’ of Manet’s ‘Olympia’, finding himself both ‘sad’ and ‘delighted’ by the results of what he considered a rebellion to the static nature of Haute Couture. ‘L’important, c’est que les filles jeunes qui, elles, n’ont jamais connu cette mode, aient envie de la porter,’ he declared.

Maybe pushed both by the ‘revival craze’ fashion is experiencing in these days and the general lack of novelty in fashion, the Fondation Yves Saint Laurent Pierre Bergé and curator Olivier Saillard decided to put on stage the infamous ‘Liberation’ collection. The set, designed by Nathalie Crinière brings us inside the laboratory of the ‘enlightened’ couturier, with clothes, sketches, fabric choices and the whole line up of the eighty-pieces collection, printed human-scale on the walls, and then moves through the many pages of newspapers which strongly criticised the collection. The exhibition comes in a moment when scandal is no longer a scandalous word. It seems difficult to pinpoint a notable peak in the flat electrocardiogram of contemporary fashion, in which revival is widely used – if not abused – but with a slightly different meaning. For Saint Laurent, revival meant provocation, a ‘historical exercise’, useful to convey a brand-new message. Nowadays we seem to be as far as possible from this idea. Revival in fashion is didactic, not to say paternalistic, and dictated more by trend and market analysis than moved cultural reasons.

There surely have been other who treated the past in the way paved by YSL in 1971; Tom Ford is at the head of the legacy. The way Tom Ford reprised the Seventies in his years at Gucci – as he does today in his eponymous collection – choosing to push on its strongest and most striding feature, sex, electing it as the leading force not only of his designs, but of all the communication shaped around them. He chose a subject, a vibe, and used the forms in which this vibe came to propose it to his contemporary audience. YSL’s collection – and the exhibition that celebrates it – shows that the real feature of revival is its relevance in relation to what happens in the present. George Orwell said that ‘those who control the present, control the past and those who control the past control the future’. Hence, to really hold – and mould – the past, we first must live and understand the present. The forward nature of fashion excludes it can be based just on nostalgia; nothing new can be done, but the ways to re-cross the past and redesign what has already been done are infinite.

Marta Franceschini – Images courtesy of Fondation Yves Saint Laurent Pierre Bergé 
25/03/2015

Aubrey Beardsley – the Man, the Myth, the Legacy

The British illustrator Aubrey Beardsley inspired and elevated the dandy look by his own persona. Beardsley was a unique man who lived the life of a rock star before such a concept even existed.

Aubrey Beardsley was often sick as child, but found refuge in literature of all sorts, mainly medical anthologies and their drawings. He early became fascinated with grotesque imagery which would later be incorporated in his own work. As an adult, his classy wardrobe was toned down in true dandy spirit, as he dressed with awareness, though without being ostentatious. It was the beginning of marking the group you belonged to, or wanted to belong, through style. In 1893 the illustrator created an alliance with author Oscar Wilde, illustrating the author’s debated play Salome. The following year, Beardsley found an individual fame with the publication of The Yellow Book. Serving as art editor to the publication, he brought his illustrations to a larger public: the journal was an overnight sensation. Beardsley’s interest in drawing macabre images didn’t, however, leave him out of the fashion world. He had a lot of knowledge of the fashion of his time and found the female attire to be ludicrous. The women in his illustrations always wore far more comfortable dresses. One of his most famous works is that of the peacock skirt, all in black and white, of course.

Aubrey Beardsley was, for most of his short life, the “party central”, but by his mid-twenties he could fall asleep in a sentence. At the age of 25 he died of tuberculosis. His editor had promised to burn most of Beardsley’s work after his death, upon the artist’s own request. However, realizing their importance of his endeavor, the editor broke his promise. During the second half of the 1960s, the Victoria & Albert Museum showcased his illustrations, perfect for the trends of that era. His erotic influences were liked by many musical artists, such as the Beatles, inspiring their album cover of Revolver. Aubrey Beardsley is a testament to the power style can have to make a mark on the world, be it through a pen or through the threads one wears.

Victoria Edman 
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