‘Christmas and Chanel Perfumes go Together’ reads the tag line of a Chanel No.5 advert in Harper’s Bazaar, 1937 New York, December issue. The world-renowned scent is perhaps the most recognizable perfume name of the 20th century, since its debut to select clients on May 5th, 1921. The release of the perfume of the fifth day of the fifth month was no coincidence, but rather an homage to Chanel’s favorite number- five. Her affiliation for the number five stemmed during her time spent at the care of nuns in Aubazine, where the pathways leading to the Cathedral were laid out in patterns of five extending into the abbey gardens. When sampling glass vials of scents numbered one to twenty for her first perfume, she of course chose the vial presented to her with the label ‘five’ on it, and thus the iconic name was born.
Chanel No.5 became a cult like fragrance, presented in a classic glass bottle, it disregarded any frivolity and fussiness of perfume bottles preceding it. The clean lines and invisible quality to the bottle design further highlights the simple, square label on the front reading ‘No.5, Chanel, Paris, Parfum’, as well as allowing focus to remain on the golden, honey coloured liquid inside. The popularity of the perfume continued decades later. In 1952 actress Marilyn Monroe claimed she wore nothing else to bed except ‘5 drops of Chanel No.5’, this statement further cemented the perfumes iconic scent status.
With such desire surrounding the perfume it is natural to see its correlation with Christmas, as a gift which is more than a perfume, but a lifestyle. Adverts in Harper’s Bazaar and Vogue from the 1920’s up until 2019 have continued to advertise Chanel No.5 as the perfect Christmas gift, emphasisng it’s timelessness, as well as revealing its modernity as the scent stands the test of time. The advert first mentioned from 1937 shows a model looking up towards the light with a flower crown on her head, evoking an aura of a Grecian Goddess, in her hands she casually holds a cigarette, placing her back into the modern world. The advert states, ‘It is only natural, then, that at Christmas, feminine thoughts turn to the perfumes of Chanel’. This idea is repeated in Harper’s Bazaar, 1985 New York, December issue, in an article titled ‘The Scents of Christmas’, illustrated with different gift boxes of Chanel No.5 containing bath oils, soaps and of course, the fragrance itself.
Harper’s Bazaar, 1937 London, December issue also featured a Chanel No.5 advert detailing the various other products you can buy to further layer your “Christmas” scent, including a cologne for men, the tag line reads ‘The Gift of Good Taste’, expressing how men and women can gift each other something synonymous with fashion. This idea is reflected in an advert from 1976 in which the various perfume products are detailed with the words, ‘You don’t have to ask for it. He knows what you want. Chanel No.5’, concluding how the fragrance has become intrinsic with gifting, lifestyle and status. Now, in 2019, the Chanel No.5 advert is the embodiment of Christmas, as snow falls around the bottle in a Chanel Christmas snow globe, complete with limited edition Christmas packaging. It is safe to say that for nearly a century now, Chanel No.5 and Christmas really has gone hand in hand.
Business in the front and party in the back. Yes, the mullet has returned. While critics have hoped the style will remain part of a regrettable past, the mullet is experiencing a comeback in fluorescent colors and dramatic lengths. What was once considered a dark spot in the history of popular culture, the hairstyle now graces the pages of Vogue and catwalks of major designers. Whether we like it or not, the mullet is here to stay for those brave enough to wear it.
The mullet seems to have emerged within the music world of the 1970s. As a precursor to giant 1980’s volumized hair, the 70’s rendition of the mullet perhaps expressed a forward-looking sensibility, a way to achieve volume on top of the head without masses of hairspray. David Bowie adopted the hairstyle in the early 1970s to capture his futuristic, androgynous character, Ziggy Stardust. The redheaded spaceman was a bizarre and shocking subversion of gender for its time. This sense of androgyny can be seen in a photograph of Paul and Linda McCartney donning matching mullets in 1973, proving that the hairstyle could easily cross gender lines. The 1970s iteration of the mullet perhaps reflected an idealistic, progressive style that could be worn by people of all genders which provided volume and long waves at the same time. It was a step towards the endless volume and curl of the 1980s, but still reflected the shaggy locks of the counterculture of the 1960s. In the 1980’s however, the hairstyle was cemented as a symbol of bad fashion. From country singer Billy Ray Cyrus’s adoption of the hairdo to the Joe Dirt films from the early 2000’s, the hairstyle has long been synonymous with white trash, the antithesis of fashion.
Paul and Linda McCartney, 1973. (Image: Liverpool Echo/Stephen Shakeshaft)
Despite the sordid past of the mullet, this hairstyle has recently been seen on high fashion catwalks, magazine pages, and it-girls across the world. Marc Jacobs has particularly been interested in bringing the mullet back. In his autumn 2013 fashion show, he outfitted all of his models in in textured, uniform mullets. Anna Sui did something similar in her autumn 2019 show, in which all of her models wore spiky, technicolor mullet wigs. Gucci has also been rigorous in rounding up personalities and musicians who have mullets for their advertising campaigns, like Dani Miller and Amy Taylor who both wear mullets as frontwomen of punk bands, Surfbort and Amyl and the Sniffers, respectively.
Marc Jacobs, Autumn/Winter 2013 (Image: Josh Haner/The New York Times)Anna Sui, Autumn/Winter 2013. (Instagram: @annasui)Dani Miller and Amy Taylor for Gucci Pre-Fall 2019. (Instagram: @gucci)
Early in the semester, our class considered the definitions of fashion, and discussed the work of Joanne Eicher and Mary Ellen Roach Higgens who wrote that dress can be considered “an assemblage of body modifications and/or supplements displayed by a person in communicating with other human beings” (15). In this sense, clothing, tattoos, piercings, and even mullets are considered fashion, and those who adopt the these elements communicate something to the world in doing so. But what exactly does the mullet communicate?
As silky, shiny beach waves and blunt bobs have become fashionable in recent years, the mullet is a rebellion against orthodox styles. The mullet does not make much sense as a practical hairdo, as the flowing layers in the back of the head need to grow long while the shortness atop of the hairdo needs constant trimming. The backs of mullets often become infamously thin “rat tails” while the front stands up strait. It doesn’t make a lot of sense as a hairstyle, but this certainly appeals to people who want to push against the beauty standards and trends of the fashion world. Suitable for any gender, the mullet is a subversion of gendered beauty standards that separates men and women by their hair. It is both male and female. When we see a mullet we conjure up memories of David Bowie and Billy Ray Cyrus, but above all, I think the mullet is a rebellion against fashion and a celebration of “bad taste.”
Joanne Eicher and Mary Ellen Roach-Higgins, “Definition and classification of Dress: Implications for Analysis of Gender Roles” in Dress and Gender: Making and Meaning, (London: Berg, 1992). 8-28.
With Christmas fast approaching, it is the time when sequins make a reappearance. Sequins are often considered a hit or miss, depending on personal taste. And yet, during this time of year stores continually produce sequined garments for the holiday season. Sequins of varying colours and sizes are eye-catching and are perfect to wear for celebrations. However, they are not only viewed as seasonal within the fashion industry but are now considered as year-round embellishments.
Often thought to be popularized by the 1970s or Michael Jackson, sequins in actuality have a long and complex history. It was Leonardo di Vinci who made a sketch for a machine to produce sequins between 1480-1482, which used pulleys and levers. However, this never came to fruition.
Instagram: @renaissance.art
The word sequin or sikka in Arabic translates as ‘coin’ or ‘minting die’, which references money and wealth. Early examples come from the Greeks, who would drill holes into coins and tie them onto clothing for the elite. Similarly, gold sequined disks sewn onto garments were found in King Tutankhauamun’s tomb in 1922, which were deemed as a way to promise financial stability in the afterlife. In the late 16th century the term transformed into the French word ‘sequin’ that has been used ever since. Sewing gold, coins or sequins onto clothing became a symbol of wealth or status, and in some parts of the world was used to ward off evil spirits. As centuries passed, sequins came to serve new functions. During the 1920s, flapper dresses were often embellished with sequins to reflect the glamour of the age. In antiquity, wearing coins was expensive, heavy and impractical. However, by the 1930s Herbert Lieberman solved this issue through developing acetate sequins when working in film production for Eastman Kodak. This allowed for plastic and lightweight sequins to be seamlessly attached to garments, as seen in the modern day.
The impact of sequins on fashion is exhibited in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. Many of their items demonstrate the long history of sequins within the industry, for example a 1932 Chanel evening dress made of saxe-blue silk that is covered with matching sequins. Furthermore, Cristóbal Balenciaga’s elaborate evening outfit reveals the designer’s interest in surface textures and patterns. In this example, the sequin discs are of varying shades of pink, which are designed to shimmer through the movements of the wearer.
As stated recently by Fashionista: “SEQUINS ARE COVERING THE SPRING 2020 RUNWAYS: Fashion’s obsession with sparkle is still going strong.” Sequins seem to be dominating modern spring fashions rather than floral prints, as shown in Marc Jacobs and Bottega Veneta’s recent shows that included a variety of shimmering evening gowns. Ultimately, designers are suggesting that sequins are not seasonal but a year-round trend.
Instagram: @britts_picksInstagram: @bottegaveneta
References
Fashionista, “SEQUINS ARE COVERING THE SPRING 2020 RUNWAYS: Fashion’s obsession with sparkle is still going strong”, https://fashionista.com/2019/09/mfw-spring-2020-trend-sequins
Fashion Gone Rogue, “How to Dazzle in Sequins this Season”, https://www.fashiongonerogue.com/sequins-about-fashion-style/
Smithsonian Magazine, “A History of Sequins from King Tut to the King of Pop”, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/a-history-of-sequins-from-king-tut-to-the-king-of-pop-8035/
Threads Magazine, “A Short History of Sequins”, https://www.threadsmagazine.com/2019/04/24/short-history-sequins
Victoria and Albert Museum Website, “Evening dress”, http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O85664/evening-dress-chanel/
Victoria and Albert Museum Website, “Evening outfit”, http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O110006/evening-outfit-balenciaga-cristobal/
Helena Klevorn “The Cardigan in Question” (2019), digital photo.
On a rainy Sunday afternoon in October, I get off the number 19 bus and am greeted by a block-long line snaking out of the Chelsea Old Town Hall. Populated in equal measure by eccentric older ladies with pastel purple hair and fashion students sporting their most recent creations, I scan the flamboyant outfits as I stroll past them, to the front of the line, and in the door.
“I have a pass,” I say, retrieving a crumpled piece of card stock from inside my (for now) empty tote bag. The ticket-checker looks at the pass. “Oh you must have been here last month!” she exclaims. “Welcome back.” I smile and confirm that yes, in fact, I had been here last month and I was back for a second helping. For “here” was not just any weekend fête at the center of Chelsea’s shopping district; “Here” was the Frock Me! vintage fashion fair, a beloved gathering for the fashion-ccentrics of London to find the (not so) latest and greatest additions to their own vintage collections.
The typically spacious main room of Chelsea Old Town Hall today feels stuffy and crowded with vintage venders from across the country, selling clothes from across the globe. Each vendor has their own stall, with only a few tables and clothing racks. Despite the pared down set-up, every vendor has brought their best and (literally) brightest, cramming their stalls with garments of every color, fabric, and ornamentation imaginable. From heavy, jangling necklaces brought in from the Middle East to the preppy, chestnut wools of New England to scratchy and constricting undergarments of Edwardian England to the slippery silk of Japanese kimonos, the very fabric of fashion history seems to have been crumpled up and stuffed beneath the grand dome of the Town Hall, like some kind of magician’s trick.
The clinking of one hanger against the next collapses my very sense of time, space, and even decent taste. Between a starched tuxedo shirt and a woolly Irish sweater, my fingers land on a smooth, silky fabric. I pull it out to find a flimsy cardigan, loosely woven, in a lime green, aqua blue, and tangerine orange zigzag pattern. I fumble around looking for the tag in anticipation of my suspicions, to find that yes, indeed, it is an authentic Missoni from its Studio 54 heyday. Perhaps to many an ugly vestige of disco sensibilities, I know I’ve found a gem. I rush to try it on in the makeshift dressing room (read: a stall in the women’s restroom).
As I slip my arms through the thin sleeves and button up the front, I feel the Missoni story wash over me. Suddenly, it’s not raining outside, I’m not in London, and it’s not even October. Instead, I’m wearing nothing but the cardigan and a teeny bikini bottom on a beach in the south of France in 1975. On a much-needed vacation after a hazy summer in glittery cocktail dresses and bouncing from gallery shows to club nights and sleeping until noon, the ease of the sporty cardigan is both a welcome respite and a nod to the “haute-bohéme” sensibilities of the fashionable upper crust. Despite the dim lighting and grey walls of the bathroom stall everything in room seems just a bit brighter.
As I exit the stall to see myself in the mirror, a woman trying on a billowing skirt looks at me and gushes, “Oh, you look just like one of those teeny girls in the 70’s! They’re the only ones who could pull that off.” I thank her, and return to the stall, dizzy with styling ideas for the cardigan: paired with old 501 jeans and a glittery sandal; draped open over a tissue-thin tank top; tied up in the center with a long, silk skirt; tucked into white linen shorts with tall gladiator sandals…it’s a feeling with which I’m not unfamiliar on these sorts of fashion journeys: When discovering something old makes everything in my closet somehow feel new again.
Feeling affirmed in my choice and excited about my warm-weather outfit prospects, I return to the vendor to see what kind of damage my wallet will have to take. To my utter surprise and delight, she says, “That one’s 22 pounds. Do you need a bag?” Feeling as though I’ve just gotten away with something illegal, I hand her a £20 note and two coins and shove the cardigan into my now only mostly-empty tote.
After a few more perusals and purchases, I leave the fair just a few minutes before it’s set to close. Exhilarated by my finds, I ride the high of the successful fashion-hunter all the way down the road to a café. As I sit down and take off my coat, I run my hand over my head. Shocked, I realize the piece of scrap silk I had worn as a headband that day has fallen off. Looking around me, I figure out that it must have come off while trying on some clothes at the fair. I resign myself to the karmic balance of it all: just as a lovely garment enters my life, so something else must go. Nothing left to say but, “Frock Me!”
There is a man standing outside a deli in New York. His long khaki raincoat is drenched by the mushy snow, and a yellow truck rushes behind him. He seems to be occupied counting pennies, hoping perhaps to be able to afford his morning coffee. Pedestrians pass him by. He is just an ordinary working man. Rendered beautiful by Saul Leiter.
Snow, 1960, by Saul Leiter. source: Foundation/Gallery Fifty On
Saul Leiter had an eye for making the ordinary extraordinary. His coloured street photographs, normally captured with a cheap 35mm, are devoid of superficiality as he captures common New Yorkers’ routine in the city.
As a young Jewish boy from Pittsburgh expected to become a rabbi, he fled his family in order to pursue a career as a painter in New York. Once in the city, he was introduced to the New York School of Photographers, which included the likes of Richard Avedon and Diane Arbu and encouraged him to take up photography.
He then spent most of his life in New York’s East Village, where he would go on to become a true pioneer of colour photography. In a world that was defined by black and white, his refreshing outlook on perspectives and colours created unique images.
Postmen, 1952, by Saul Leiter. source: Howard Greenberg Gallery, New York.Through Boards, 1957, by Saul Leiter. source: Howard Greenberg Gallery, New York
His training as a painter was clearly visible in his wonderful compositions of daily life as the influence of Japanese ukiyo-e and Expressionism clearly altered his shapes and colours. The dramatic cropping of the frame, the blurred focal points, the odd layering of multiple depths, … His photographs were pre-emptively moulded by his painterly vision.
Saul Leiter shaped an alternate reality which establishes a sense of intimacy between the subject and the onlooker by capturing pictures through mirrors, glasses and windows, in rain, snow or shine. As one of the first public consumers of Kodachrome film in the 50s and 60s, he would opt for out-of-date film in order to keep the cost of his hobby reasonable. This would embed his films with a muted and soft effect, which would only enhance the mysticality of everyday life.
Newspaper Kiosk, 1955, by Saul Leiter. source: Howard Greenberg Gallery, New York
The common scene is made ambiguous through his photographs, which not only heightens the senses of the viewer but transforms it into something wonderful and mysterious. Somehow, his photographic skills transposes the anonymity of the city onto the people of New York.
Saul Leiter’s coloured street works were however not displayed or recognised until well into the 90s. He was mostly known for dominating the pages of Harper’s Bazaar, Elle and Vogue in the 60s as a fashion photographer, and for introducing colour into the mundane black and white world of Haute Couture.
His career as a fashion photographer was nevertheless short-lived as it never truly brought him satisfaction – influenced by what he called a ‘Zen lifestyle’ he never sought out fame and even claimed that “in some secret place in my being was a desire to avoid success”.
Soames Bantry, Nova, 1960, by Saul Leiter. source: Howard Greenberg Gallery, New YorkPhotograph by Saul Leiter source: Saul Leiter Foundation
It was ultimately his own wish for anonymity behind the camera that allowed him to create fugitive and cryptic renditions of the common New Yorker’s daily life. By using a new fashionable and commercial medium such as colour photography to render modernity and anonymity in his city, he renews Baudelaire’s own vision of modernity.
It is therefore only fair to suppose that, through his abstraction of the ordinaire and visions of the fleeting moment, Saul Leiter can allegedly be considered as New York’s own “contemporary flâneur”, equipped with a lens.
Once we turned the clocks back and it started to get dark around 4:00 pm, I immediately broke out my knitting supplies and resumed my favorite winter activity of making scarves, hats, sweaters, and mittens. Not only does it feel cozy to knit once it is dark and cold outside, it is a tactile hobby that is very rewarding after staring at a phone or laptop screen all day. I’m not the only millennial that feels this way and has learned to knit. Many of my friends and peers are knitters or crocheters and it is a common trend among 20-somethings. In response to this demand, there are numerous online “knit kit” companies that make it easy to learn to knit, learn new stitches, and start new projects. There are also numerous local yarn shops to buy supplies and find a community of knitters. Online, there are knitting communities like Ravelry that are a great resource for patterns and YouTube has a trove of video knitting tutorials.
Pair of mittens I knitted this year.
In a fashion industry that actively hides the systems and conditions of production from the consumers, hand knitting brings the production right into the consumer’s own home. By knitting the item, knitters know that workers haven’t been exploited and there are no harmful environmental side effects when making the garment. (This is only true if the yarn used was produced in an ethical way.) The allure of doing the work yourself is possibly in response to a romanticizing of a pre-industrial revolution society. This nostalgia manifests as a trend for personalized, bespoke items that reject the unethical and ecologically harmful production methods of large fashion corporations. Knitting is a more accessible way to accomplish this production at home compared to sewing. Sewing requires more tools and knowledge, whereas knitting can be a casual activity that is done in front of the TV or talking with friends.
Hat in progress with pattern instructions.
Knitting is also related to the “hipster” trend of enjoying analogue objects like records, typewriters, and polaroid cameras. To millennials and other young people, these items could be reminiscent of a time when lives were not based in the digital world but in a physical, tactile one. They are also a brief respite from the digital world where we view glowing screens and have our touch mediated through a mobile device, laptop, or TV. Physically touching knitting needles or a polaroid camera is how a new scarf or polaroid picture is created. There is no mediation of touch through a screen and the product it creates, unlike digital images or applications, is available to touch and manipulate in real life. In this age of instant gratification, knitting is also a lesson of patience. Sweaters and scarves can take hours and hours to make (especially if you mess up a few stitches!). This, along with the physical product, makes finishing a knitting project more rewarding than anything accomplished on a laptop or phone.
Personally, I enjoy knitting because it lets me design my own scarves, gloves, and sweaters and I can make great personal gifts for my friends and family. I like having control of the design process by choosing the type of wool, the color of yarn, and the pattern to create exactly what I’m envisioning. This winter I am attempting to knit socks – a technical challenge I have not mastered yet.
The relationship between art and fashion is fraught with complexities, but the two disciplines have always drawn heavily from one another, in ways both synergistic and hostile. At the Wallace Collection’s recent exhibition An Enquiring Mind: Manolo Blahnik at the Wallace Collection, we are presented with a glistening example of the collaborative nature of art and fashion at its best—a clear representation of how art can inform the fashion design process. Juxtaposing some of the designer’s most beautiful shoe creations with prominent works of art by Boucher, Rubens, Titian, and Gainsborough, all within in the architecturally exquisite setting of Hertford House, there is an obvious decadence to the exhibit that is impossible to not enjoy on an aesthetic level.
The Wallace Collection is rich and vast on its own—difficult to digest with a single visit. Upon walking in, I was pleasantly struck by the degree to which Blahnik’s shoes blended seamlessly with the collection—nothing felt forced, out of place. It was as though the shoes were a permanent part of the collection, echoing not only the paintings on the walls, but the gilding of a cabinet, the richness of a velvet window curtain. Each room was organized thematically to display a different historical moment or story, from the dimly lit baroque, full of velvet and brocade, to “Avant-Garde Fashion.” For fans of fashion, the exhibit offers clear insight into Blahnik’s creative process—the designer credits the museum’s collection as a source of design inspiration, and from early sketches to the final product it is clear how he has brought the fantastical aspects of the art into the realm of the living.
Image C/O Olivia Smales
Nestled between the paintings and gilded clocks and vases, I found myself engaging with the shoes as art objects rather than wearable items—objects of beauty, much like the paintings on the walls. Conceptions of art versus craft are challenged, and a dialogue between the two prompts the viewer to question what makes an object “art” to begin with. What are the difference between the traditional ‘high brow’ mediums of painting and sculpture, and where does fashion fall?
Placed within delicate domed glass cases, the shoes feel all the more at home in their rich and fantastical setting, precious objects to be protected from the corruptions of the external world. Despite this layer of glass between object and viewer, the shoes imbue the space with a certain unexpected intimacy. At a time in which fashion exhibitions are often sensationalized and overcrowded, it is refreshing to be able to get close to the shoes, to examine the subtle relationships between the objects and their surroundings, the details of their meticulous design.
Beyond crafting a dialogue, the shoes and paintings bring new meanings to one another, notably a pair of infamous Manolo’s—pink shoes designed for Sofia Coppola’s 2006 film Marie Antoinette. The shoes are placed beneath Fragonard’s The Swing (1767)in which a woman kicks off a pair of candy-floss pink heels that are remarkably similar. The viewer is immediately transported to the realm of the painting, able to connect via this real world object, and simultaneously better able to understand how Blahnik may have conceptualized these shoes to begin with. The same shoes exhibited within the sterile confines of a luxury store might appear as simple objects for purchase by the privileged, drawing attention to the importance of context when it comes to all works of art (called to mind are Andy Warhol’s Brillo boxes, and those same boxes on a supermarket shelf…).
Images C/O Olivia Smales
While perhaps a stereotypically feminine object, the shoes crystallized the presence of women, both within the collection and throughout history. I found myself noticing prominent female figures in the works of art around me, and considering the place of women across history, from the Marquesses who once inhabited Hertford House to the largely female crowd viewing the shoes around me.
We all share in the experience of putting on shoes. Whether or not they are as decadent as those designed by Blahnik, there is a familiarity to the object, and a desire to know who stood in these shoes before, and to be like them. The exhibition offers something to art and fashion fans alike, teaching art fans about a revolutionary designer, and bringing in a crowd who may otherwise have missed out on the Wallace collection’s treasures.
This summer I attended the Met’s Camp: Notes on Fashion exhibition. The hype surrounding this annual exhibition is initially generated from the Met Gala held in May, which officially celebrates its opening and is considered one of the most important fashion events of the year. After seeing pictures of models, celebrities and designers processing up the famous museum stairs, I was excited to see such eccentric and elaborate outfits in person. I was also looking forward to gaining a deeper understanding of the term ‘camp’ which I recognized had a deeper meaning and history than I was aware of.
Camp was based off of Susan Sontag’s 1964 “Notes on Camp,” which brought the term into mainstream culture. Likewise to Sontag, the curators of the museum sought to explore the various connotations of the word and its affect upon culture and fashion. Camp is a term often synonymous with LGBT culture, however it can refer to anything theatrical, artificial, excessive, effeminate and much more. Andrew Bolton, the Wendy Yu Curator in Charge of the Costume Institute, states that the aim of the exhibition was to generate more questions than answers, as camp is incredibly difficult to define. Through basing the exhibition around Sontag’s essay, I found that it gave the audience a lens in which to view the objects and items of clothing. In the first room, Sontag’s “58 principles of camp” is outlined and details how terms such as nostalgia, irony, pastiche and parody are used to describe camp. I thought that this was a great way to prepare the viewers for the sensory overload of what was to come.
Jeremy Scott (American, born 1975) for House of Moschino (Italian, founded 1983). Ensemble, spring/summer 2018. Courtesy of Moschino. Author’s own image.
Camp was divided into two sections, with the first looking at the origins of camp and the second showing how it is reflected in fashion. I thought the chronological theme was extremely helpful in enhancing the viewer’s understanding of how the camp sensibility has pervaded throughout history and into modern day culture. Bolton argues that the reemergence of camp in the present decade is not surprising as it comes about during periods of social, economic and political change. This in turn led me to think about how certain exhibitions are chosen by curators during the time when the public imagination needs them most.
The visitor is immediately confronted by the bright pink walls of the exhibition, which welcomes them into the loud and excessive world of the camp aesthetic.
The first room details how camp came about in order to challenge conventional notions of beauty, through adopting a daring and bold style. In the first few rooms, objects from Versailles, Louis XIV and Oscar Wilde show how an increasingly theatrical style developed, which valued the nineteenth century ideal of male beauty. This emphasizes how camp is found not just in fashion, but also in a variety of other forms that span different centuries and geographies.
I thought that the most impressive room of the exhibition was a vast space filled with varying glass cases that contained different examples of camp clothing. The indefinable nature of camp is exhibited by the voice-over of a variety of quotes in this room, which are narrated by different celebrities and important figures; for example, Phoebe Philo for Céline recounts a quote by Mark Booth that “Camp is mock luxurious.”
View of the “Camp: Notes On Fashion” Exhibition, Metropolitan Museum of Art NYC. Author’s own image.
Camp is defined by artifice and exaggeration, to do with style and not content that is expressed in fashion through colour, patterns, shapes, ornament and materials. Below are some pictures from my visit that I thought captured this:
Jeremy Scott (American, born 1975) for House of Moschino (Italian, founded 1983). Dress, spring/summer 2017. Courtesy of Moschino. Author’s own image.Sequined Vogue–Sequined “Vogue Magazine” Jumpsuit from Gianni Versace S/S 1991. Author’s own image.Gown from Giambattista Valli Haute Couture. Author’s own image.
Overall, I found that the representation of camp within fashion was one of excess, which was shown through the overload of sequins, bows and feathers on the items. The exhibition was an immersive one, asking the viewer to consider their own conceptions of camp and how this can be challenged. I thought that the curators successfully showed how camp is present in our culture and everyday lives as it embraces both high art, popular culture and a variety of other opposing features.
Textile as Resistance: The Power of Fabrics Without Slogans is the latest offering in MoMu Antwerp’s external programme of events whilst the fashion museum is closed for renovation and development. It is currently on display on the upmost floor of Texture Kortrijk, a fitting guest location given that this innovative textile museum is devoted to the international networks of exchange and influence that lie behind the local production of flax and linen in the Flemish province of West Flanders. Nestled on the River Lys, Kortrijk is home to linen damasks – originating, of course, from the Syrian capital Damascus – where locals pioneered a particular technique of production in the late 15th century, with a signature trademark of symmetrical patterns depicting hunting scenes, historical battles and biblical stories. Positioned at an apposite local/global intersection, the exhibition Textile as Resistance weaves together geography – telling stories of the land, nationality – telling stories of the nation, and identity – telling stories of the self, all narrated through the powerful storytelling medium of cloth.
Textile as Resistance at Texture Kortrijk, (c) MoMu Antwerp, Photo: Stany DederenPalestinian dolls in traditional festive dress made at the Ein El-Hilweh camp where 64 women are trained in this technique in order to preserve the Palestinian embroidery and heritage. Beirut, Lebanon, 2019, (c) Photo: Mashid Mohadjerin
Fashion and textiles are, of course, emphatically transnational phenomena, which operate across rather than within hermetically-sealed borders. We know that clothing is transformed by the different pairs of hands through which it passes –acquiring new values, serving different purposes, bearing the biographical traces of both maker and wearer. It is precisely this mobility – not least the privileged potential that fabric occupies as the connective tissue between individuals, communities, cultures and nations – which the exhibition curators take as their starting point. Whilst photographer Mashid Mohadjerin (b. Iran, 1976) and journalist Samira Bendadi (b. Morocco, 1966) conceived of the exhibition in Antwerp, the compelling stories of migration and diversity that it narrates expand far beyond the borders of Europe, unravelling identities and histories that stretch back and forth across the world. The curators were concerned, first and foremost, with the messages that textiles embody and disseminate as an insidious form of resistance – one that is frequently mobilised by women in response to war and crisis. The exhibition thus encapsulates Shahidha Bari’s acknowledgment in Dressed: The Secret Life of Clothes (2019) that clothing the body is a means of ‘turning out’, of mobilising a critical engagement with our surrounding world. It is a pertinent topic, painfully resonant amidst the European migrant crisis, which has witnessed more than 4,000 deaths in 2018 alone. Textiles as Resistance interrogates how clothing and fashion can respond to social and cultural displacement, reassuring individuals who are in search of their identities and a communal sense of belonging.
Textile as Resistance at Texture Kortrijk, (c) MoMu Antwerp, Photo: Stany DederenStreet scene depicting two portraits of the former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. Beirut, Lebanon, 2019, (c) Photo: Mashid Mohadjerin
What is made clear from the outset is that neither identity, nor textiles, can be easily reduced to a singular narrative. Nor can they be straightforwardly mapped onto a spinning globe – especially when considered in relation to globally distributed production and consumption networks, the lasting effects of colonialism, imperialism and decolonisation, and asylum and migration in both the past and present. The large-scale map that viewers are presented with on entering the exhibition makes this point palpably clear. Antwerp is at the epicentre. From here, needles threaded with red cotton have been stitched across the map, drawing lines to locations as far afield as Nigeria, Morocco, Iran and Mexico. Russia appears vast, whilst the USA is far smaller than cartography normally affords it. Geography is presented as a fictitious retelling. By logical conclusion, the viewer is encouraged to recognise that using geographical boundaries as a tool to analyse religious, cultural and national identities remains ceaselessly problematic. It resonates with the remarks of geographers Martin Lewis and Karen Wigan in their seminal text The Myth of Continents: A Critique of Metageography (1996): ‘we talk of African wildlife as if it constituted a distinct assemblage of animals’ and yet countries and continents do not neatly denote biological and cultural groupings. Similarly, the mapping of nations encourages a false understanding of the world as a jigsaw of discreet places that can be examined in isolation. African wax print cloth, which originated in Asia inspired by Indonesian Batik and was only introduced to the African continent in the late 19th century by the Dutch company Vlisco, is a case in point. The truth is that identity is situational; it involves both insiders and outsiders to the group, acquires new meanings as it travels, and remains in an inconclusive state of continually ‘becoming’.
Human stories, as the exhibition makes clear, often have the greatest currency, particularly those that give individuals the greatest prominence, both physically and emotionally. One of the subjects given a voice is Samira Salah (b. what was then Palestine, now Israel, 1945), who questions: ‘What does it mean to be a Palestinian today? My daughter has French nationality and my other daughter has German nationality because their husbands have these nationalities […] Nationality is not identity. Ultimately, the Palestinian issue is not a matter for Palestinians alone. It is a universal and human issue. You don’t have to be a Palestinian to embrace the Palestinian cause’. It is the process of enquiry that appears most cathartic in many of the stories narrated and is rooted in the painstaking processes of sewing, embroidering and textile printing, which bring makers and wearers together in intimate dialogue that transcends religious, cultural and national borders. Another story shared is that of Zena Sabbagh (b. Syria, 1971), who lives in the Lebanese capital of Beirut, where she has transformed her living room into a meeting place for women to socialise, sew and share stories. ‘I don’t like the word ‘refugee’’, she explains. ‘Refugees are people who have been forced to leave their country. But why not meet and get to know the others? I’m against borders. I’m for getting people to meet.’ Many of these tantalising snapshots of lives lived in the face of adversity are left deliberately untied. Whilst the exhibition catalogue provides further insight, the fragmented method of display fits the disjointed stories and memories that are recalled by the subjects, prompting speculation on the part of the viewer, who may feel inclined to fill in the gaps with his or her own thoughts, feelings and lived experiences of identity. It is this humanitarian aspect of the exhibition that resonates so profoundly with the viewer: these are human stories, and it is the very personal relationship that we have to clothing – our intimate knowledge of how it feels on our skin, how it moves on our bodies, and how it connects us to other people and to the world at large that the curators so expertly tap into.
Zolaykha Sherzad, Afghan-born designer wearing one of her native inspired coats. She deconstructs existing pieces and reunites the textiles into in new pieces that reflect on new perspectives and hopes for a better future. Paris, France, 2019, (c) Photo: Mashid Mohadjerin
African Fashion Weekend at the Meise Botanic Garden. Brussels, Belgium, 2019, (c) Photo: Mashid Mohadjerin
Textile as Resistance is a pivotal contribution to the fashion exhibition landscape in Europe, which emphasises non-Eurocentric narratives of fashion and clothing exchange. Belgium, like most European nations, has a chequered history of colonisation, decolonisation, asylum and migration, the ramifications of which are strongly felt in the postcolonial present. Exhibitions such as this, by inviting a diverse range of nationalities, cultures, ethnicities, identities and histories into the gallery space, provide a necessary voice and visibility to the lived experiences of Belgian’s immigrant population. As MoMu Director Kaat Debo explains, ‘Antwerp is home to more than 170 nationalities. 183 languages are spoken here. The exhibition is part of our mission to make MoMu meaningful for everyone and to enable social, aesthetic and personal change’. It is a perspective that underlines the importance of global perspectives in shaping local identities, whilst reiterating that fostering strong local roots is not in opposition to sharing an international outlook. Just as ‘national’ fashion cultures are always mediated by ‘international’ networks of exchange, Textiles as Resistance marks a systematic shift in museum curation to present histories of globalisation as truly histories of the globe, rather than continuing Eurocentric histories of the West. The success of the exhibition will ultimately be measured in terms of its ability to attract a substantial number of new audiences from migration backgrounds into the museum, and for the stories articulated to have an impact long after the exhibition closes on 16th February 2020.
Malak Bakoor, has her own embroidery workgroup involving Syrian women in Shatila Refugee Camp. Beirut, Lebanon, 2019, (c) Photo: Mashid Mohadjerin
Mexico City room at the Barbican, which lacked the “voom”. (author’s own image)
“I was kind of expecting more, va va voom.”
“There is va va, just no voom.”
I overheard this remark from a couple behind me, as I walked into another skeletal space that was part of the Barbican Art Gallery’s exhibit, Into the Night: Cabarets and Clubs in Modern Art. Similar to me, those visitors were disenchanted by this exploration of Modern Art through nightlife, in cities such as Tehran, London, Mexico City, Berlin, and Ibadan, between the 1880s’-1960s’.
I previously went to the Barbican in 2017 to see Basquiat: Boom for Real. Similar to the artists and artworks featured in Into the Night, Jean-Michel Basquiat was deeply influenced by nightlife. At that exhibit, the clubs and streets of New York City radiated from the artworks and into the gallery space. But in comparison, the atmosphere of Into the Night was extremely muted.
Carpet sample and curtain design for Cabaret Fledermaus, 1907. Designed by Josef Hoffman.
Into the Night, begins in Vienna at Cabaret Fledermaus. The gallery space features posters, plans, designs, and decorative art objects from Fledermaus. The objects were sparsely spread out across the gallery on frozen grey walls and a blue display platform. The wall text said that Cabaret Fledermaus was a place where “‘[the] boredom’ of contemporary life would be replaced by the ‘ease of art and culture.’” I did not feel this when I walked around the gallery. Viewing objects such as the original curtain designs, a carpet sample, and some well-preserved posters felt more like observing specimens in a lab than experiencing “art and culture”. Cabarets and clubs are intrinsically and indubitably lively, but the Barbican failed to capture the conditions that these objects derived from, and the objects failed to capture the aura of their conditions. While the Barbican provided “recreations” of some cabarets and clubs in the lower gallery level, as Time Out critic Eddy Frankel noted, they felt static and disjoined from the original “exchange” between these places and Modern Art.
Film stills from Film Lumiere no 765,1- Danse serpentine [II], featuring Loïe Fuller by Austste and Louis Lumière, c. 1897-99.
When I entered the space that focused on American dancer Loïe Fuller’s contributions to the Folies-Bergere, I was mesmerized and captivated by Fuller’s movements and could feel her fill the room. The wall text said Fuller utilized costume and color as a means for experimenting with dance. As she twirled and swished in costumes painted in violet, red, and green on film color against the black and white film, you could see how modernism was moving forward from its grey past. Fuller’s costume and movements claimed the space of the Folies-Bergere. But more importantly, her work showed how Modern Art developed in clubs and cabarets because those spaces challenged artists to claim and refine their craft in an atmosphere that provided boundless empowerment and inspiration.
Except for a few notable rooms (New York City, Berlin, and the room dedicated to Loïe Fuller), Into the Night is an encyclopedic approach to exhibiting Modern Art’s relationship to clubs and cabarets, and ultimately fails to enhance a visitor’s understanding of this sacred relationship.
Sources:
Frankel, Eddy, “Into the Night: Cabarets and Clubs in Modern Art review.” Time Out London, 2019.
![Photo of woman in green dress dancing from Film Lumiere no 765,1- Danse serpentine [II]](https://sites.courtauld.ac.uk/documentingfashion/wp-content/uploads/sites/27/2019/11/Imani-Film1.jpg)
![Photo of woman in pink dress dancing from Film Lumiere no 765,1- Danse serpentine [II]](https://sites.courtauld.ac.uk/documentingfashion/wp-content/uploads/sites/27/2019/11/Imani-Film2.jpg)
