Fashion Contextual Studies with Kim Charnley

Our first small task was to choose an item of clothing i.e. Trousers/skirts/corsets etc. and explore where it originated from and the kind of impressions and professions it's usually associated with. I decided to delve into bow ties, of which I made a mind map for to help stream my ideas -

Bow Ties Mind map

This task, although small, helped me view fashion in a whole new way and approach. I began to realize the importance of what we wore as everything gives off an impression. For example, the bow tie, on first thoughts I'd just imagine that 'fancy' or posh people would wear them - this alone being an impression, but when really thinking about it I realized there's more behind it. It can be a sign of intelligence, wealth or imply a quirky, interesting or fun character and I also discovered it's origins and how it became fashionable in the 18th and 19th Centuries.

1) Fashion Politics

How can we think about the relation between fashion and politics - both now and in the past?

This is a really interesting question, as typically we don't assume fashion is politics related but it is. For example, Hugo Boss actually designed the SS Nazi uniform - In 1931, he joined the Nazi Party (two years before Hitler came to power) and produced the all black uniforms along with the brown SA shirts and the black and brown uniforms of the 'Hitler Youth'. The Hugo Boss company were formed of French and Polish prisoners of war who were forced into labour and after the second world war, Hugo Boss was fined for supporting Nazism and lost his right to vote. Discovering this really shocked me, when I hear the name Hugo Boss, I wouldn't have thought to associate it with a Nazi supporting, slave labouring company as the company is so known and yet there's secrets behind it. However now, Hugo Boss is just a brand name supplying overpriced perfumes and tailored suits.

Image if the SS Uniform designed by Hugo Boss

"Our identity is constructed" - showing personality through what you wear, helping actors find their character with costume. George Simmel, a sociologist, said that fashion had a double meaning of expressing ourselves but also fitting in with a group.

Gender

How does fashion help to communicate or construct gender identity?

Age

How does getting older relate to fashion? 

The term 'teenager' wasn't invented until the 1940/50s.

What questions are raised by children's fashion?

Analysing Thrift Shop music video -

Video by Macklemore and Ryan Lewis -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QK8mJJJvaes

The video is a satire/ spoof of other hip-hop music videos. It shows Macklemore and Ryan Lewis wearing clothes and accessories which they've purchased from Charity shops or hand-me-downs relating to economy as people pay a lot of money for labels/brands, "Yo - that's fifty dollars for a T-shirt." They're able to get it cheaper through thrift shops but still get the labels and express their style, "I'm gonna pop some tags, only got twenty dollars in my pocket." The use of fur coats suggest wealth and 'pimp' connotations - Macklemore is shown wearing a fur coat with ladies around him, I think this is part of the spoof element as he says he got the coat for ninety nine cents and it smells like pee. I think it promotes re-using as it's environmentally friendly to reuse clothes instead of throwing them out and it also helps and contributes support to Charity.

Image from Music video of Macklemore in fur coat

2) Fashion and Revolution - Past/Future/Modern

Raymong Williams - Keywords (1976)
describes modern as being "nearer to our own contemporary meaning now, just now."

In 1938 Karl Lagerfeld became head of Chanel. It is currently lead by Brazilian designer Laurence Roberge Bernardo. "L'art du capter l'air du temps" (The art of capturing the spirit of age."

Until the 19th Century in Europe there were 'sumptuary' laws in place that required people to dress according to their class of their profession. They were used to identify social rank and often used for social discrimination, preventing 'commoners' from dressing like aristocrats. However, during the French Revolution, aristocrats were being beheaded in the streets so people avoided dressing like them.

In the 1980's there were attempts to change the perception of wearing fur, "It takes up to 40 dumb animals to make a fur coat. But only one to wear it" - LYNX (campaigning company).

Lynx fur Campaign 1980's

I think their method of advertising is really effective as they imply that we're animals, but also cruel as we sacrifice a large number of animals for one coat. At the time, I think this would have been a shocking advertisement as people were probably unaware or didn't really consider what process animals went through to create their fashionable fur collections. The use of black print with the streak of blood red smeared across the image really emphasizes the brutal torture animals face when obtaining their fur. Previously, fur related to a high status and implied a rich status but with the advance in new materials, people became more aware of the suffering animals were facing in the name of fashion.

'Liberty leading the people' Painting by Eugene Delacroix, 1831.

The painting shows a woman raising the French tricolour flag with a troupe of fighters following her into battle. Dying and dead bodies are shown laying defeated on the ground and a young boy is pictures carrying a pistol in each hand with his right hand raised above his head. Delacroix depicts the 1830 French Revolution (The July revolution) in this amazing painting. The woman holding the flag represents Liberty, I think that her being pictures barefoot and her breasts on show emphasize this sense of liberation and battle for freedom. The diverse group of fighters; young and old, rich and poor, fair and dark, are Parisians who took to the streets to overthrow king Charles X. The man in the top hat with the rifle is apparently Delacroix himself who also took part in the revolution.

'Sans-Culotte' - The changing from breeches to trousers. This was a radical change during the French Revolution and was used as a general term for underrepresented French labourers and commoners who resorted to mob violence as they felt frustrated that their efforts were largely unrewarded and concerns were unrecognized. However, by the 1840's all men were wearing trousers.  

  Sans-Culotte by Louise-Leopold Boilly, 1792 Charles Frederick Worth 1826-1895 was the creator of 'couture', he was an Englishman who relocated to France and was the first to create different fashion for different seasons but also simplified construction so clothing could be mass produced. Worth started as an apprentice and clerk for two different London textile merchants, this is where he began learning about the technical aspects of making clothing and gained a broad understanding of fabric and business. After moving to Paris, he started to work for Gagelin (a prominent firm selling textile goods and ready to wear pieces) and quickly became the company's leading salesman. Worth's designs for Gagelin won prizes at the Great Exhibition in London and the Exposition Universelle in Paris, leading him to open his own company in 1858. With the high demand for luxury goods under the Second Empire, Worth's business took off and he became a dressmaker for Empress Eugenie (Napoleon III's wife).

A portrait of Charles Frederick Worth and two gowns from his collections in the late 19th century.

In the 1890's women started cycling as a way of demonstrating freedom and challenging the conservative dress code of the time.

1968 was another year of revolution, starting in Nanterre students and artists, they took to the streets and protested which lasted for months. This started anti-fashion.

The Woodstock Festival in 1969

Other revolution and fashion changes -

• Punk or anti-fashion - 1960's and 1970's
• The mini-skirt was brought out in the 1960's - this was because of air hostess' and sexual liberation
• Futuristic designs in the 1960's after the sci-fi film Barbarella (costumes designed by Paco Rabanne with Jacques Fontenray)
• The 1969 Rocket landing - in the 1970's futuristic fashion became signature for David Bowie's 'Ziggy Stardust' character

David Bowie as Ziggy stardust 1971

3) Subculture

Culture, "a whole way of life" meaning a broad range of activities geared towards classifying symbolically within a society - Sherken and Cartwright 2009:3 Practices of Looking: An introduction to Visual Culture.

Culture (and subculture) is produced through complex networks of talking, gesturing, looking and acting, through which meanings are exchanged between members of a group or society.

Spectacular subcultures - these are cultures that are well known and well visible.
Mod subculture - modern.

Japanese subculture - Ganguro.
Ganguro literally means “black face”. It started in the 1990's and reached it’s high peak in 2000, Japanese girls would dye their hair blonde or orange and tan their skin. Their hair was usually short and curly in light brown or white, silver streaks were also very common. Mini skirts, long coats and platform boots were very popular. Dark foundation, subtle white eye shadow around the eyes, black eyeliner and white lipstick are the trademark makeup of the style. Manifestations of this style, called yamanba or manda, use more accentuated cosmetics.

'Teenagers' - The term started in the 1950's as adolescents were more wealthy and independent, they didn't depend on their parents, drove cars, listened to rock and roll and had more time on their hands.

The Sex Pistols swore on live Television in 1976 -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0IAYFh0CaI
This contributed to the punk subculture and the whole anarchy attitude in 'teenagers'.

Vice magazine started in the 1990's, it was a free magazine which talked about sex, drugs and rock and roll.

Vice Magazine cover from the 1990's

4) The Gaze

The gaze - to look or stare with eagerness or desire.

"Men act and women appear" - John Berger, ways of seeing, 1972 book.

Paintings which support this statement

'Nell Gwynne' by Lely 1618-1680

The nakedness is not an expression of her feelings, it is of submission to the viewer and spectator. The use of the child appearing in the painting relates to the maternal nature of the woman. Her eyes are gazing out of the painting, she's fixed on the viewer/owner of the painting making her the subject to be gazed at.



The Venus of Urbino by Titian 1487-1576

The images of nude women in European were presented for the male spectator as the spectator was always deceived to be male.

Bacchus, Ceres and Cupid by Von Aachen 1552-1615

Sometimes the painting includes a male lover but the women's gaze is usually looking away or out of the picture to her 'true lover', which is the owner of the painting.

Vanity by Hans Memling 1453-1494

Berger says, "The mirror was often used as a symbol of the vanity of women. The moralizing, however, was mostly hypocritical. You painted a naked woman because you enjoyed looking at her, you put a mirror in her hand and you called the painting Vanity, thus morally condemning the woman whose nakedness you had depicted for your own pleasure. The real function of the mirror was otherwise. It was to make the woman connive in treating herself as, first and foremost, a sight."

Susanna and the Elders by Tintoretto 1518-1594

We look at her being looked at by the Elders as she looks in a mirror and sees herself as a sight for the Elders and for the spectator.

Body as display - Women

• Women are depicted in images very differently from men
• The image of a female nude woman is posed as if her body is on display
• The female body is understood as a form of desire

 Body of action - Men

Sculpture - Athlete wrestling with a python by Fredric Leighton 1877. Homosexuality was normal in Greek times.

In this sculpture, the male is depicted as a strong hero figure, fighting this venomous beast. As homosexuality was common in Greek times, again the intended viewer would be men.

Examples in todays media

• Bond girls and James bond
• Mario and The Princess
• Disney Princess' and Princes
• Pornography/nude magazines
• Blurred lines music video by Robin Thick

Marilyn Monroe

"People have a habit of looking at me as if I'm some kind of mirror instead of a person. They didn't see me, they saw their own lewd thoughts then they white washed themselves by calling me the lewd one."

Laura Mulvey 1975 Article: Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema - coined the term the male gaze. Male gaze has three different looks: the camera which records the events, "According to principles of ruling, ideology...the male figure cannot bear the burden of sexual objectification."

• Scopophilia - derived from the Greek "love of looking", literally the desire to see, linked to sexual attraction.
• Voyeurism - looking produces voyeurs, the desire to see the erotic and the forbidden.

 

5) Dress and Social change

Modernism - latest things: the latest styles, tastes, attitudes, or practices

Hedonistic - a person whose life is devoted to the pursuit of pleasure and self-gratification.

In the 1920's women stopped wearing corsets which was liberating.

The Prince of Wales brought knitted jumpers into fashion in 1922.

What do social changes in clothing have to do with social changes?

Does clothing express something to do with an era?

 or does clothing make it possible to do different things?

Group Presentation

Group 9 - Bethan, Lucy, Emilly and I.

We all agreed to talk about the subculture Steampunk for our presentation. As a group we then split the subject into topics we could discuss and decided who would research and discuss which chosen topics.

Here's the topics we decided to discuss on Steampunk:

• Victorian Era
• D.I.Y subculture
• Industrial revolution
• Literature
• Lifestyle, elitist
• Steampunk Fashion
• Films/Modern takes, pop culture, art
• Les Machines

My topics to discuss were: films/modern takes/art, Les Machines and Steampunk fashion, we decided that we'd all look into Steampunk fashion and combine our findings in the final presentation.

notes from research: The Steampunk Bible: An Illustrated Guide to the World of Imaginary Airships, Corsets and Goggles, Mad Scientists, and Strange Literature by Jeff VanderMeer, 2011 (book).

- pg. 178 onwards are Steampunk influenced films; Georges Melies - 'Le Voyage dans la lune' (A trip to the moon, 1902), 20,000 leagues under the sea (1954), The Fabulous world of Jules Verne (1958).

Hayao Miyazaki, Japanese film director, animator, mangaka, illustrator, producer, and screenwriter. Talking about the moving castle from Howl's moving Castle(2004) film: "Miyazaki is able to give his airships such a realistic physicality. Unlike in Laputa, the details of Howl's moving Castle are aligned with the role of the tinker or maker in Steampunk subculture with a magical twist. Details of it's construction - stomping along on little chicken legs that don't seem equal to the task of balancing the seemingly unplanned series of building code violations that comprise it's structure, it belches smoke out of it's chimney like an old man coughing. It's cutting edge technology, disguised by elements of the past."

A Trip to the Moon analysis in my own words - a group of men, who I assume are astronomers, travel to the moon by being shot in a capsule rocket from a giant cannon. The capsule hits the moon in the eye, they are then captured by moon men by discover that they explode into dust when hit by their umbrellas. This allows them to escape and return to Earth to which they are praised and worshiped as hero figures. - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FrdVdKlxUk (The whole film)

Notes from my slides for the presentation (also included in the notes on the final presentation) -

Slide 1 - The first Steampunk film, according to the Steampunk bible is Georges Melies' 'Le Voyage dans la lune' which means A Trip to the moon, released in 1902. You can watch the whole film on Youtube because it's only roughly 13 minutes long and basically it's about these men who travel to the moon in this capsule like rocket which gets shot from a giant cannon and it lands in the moon's eye. They then get captured by these moon-men but realize they burst into dust when hit with their umbrellas, so they manage to escape and return to the Earth. George Melies actually stars in the film.

Slide 2 - During the 1950's and 60's, most Steampunk inspired films came from adaptions of the works of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells, including Disney's 20,000 Leagues under the sea (1954), The Time Machine (1960) and The Fabulous World of Jules Verne (1958).

Slide 3 - A large number of recent truly Steampunk films have come from Japanese film makers. For example, Hayao Miyazaki, who made films like; Laputa: Castle in the sky(1986) which was one of the first modern Steampunk classics. He also produced Howl's moving castle in 2004. There were two other Japanese films released in 2004 - Casshern and Steamboy. Here's images of Laputa, Howl's moving Castle, Casshern and Steamboy. (On powerpoint)

Slide 4 - Here's a list of some films I've seen which I think have Steampunk influence, but there are a lot more I'm sure. Here's a picture of Hugo, which is a really great film which actually references 'A Trip to the moon' as there's a toy shop owner in the film who turns out to be Georges Melies and they show clips of some of his films as he made hundreds.

Slide 5 - Les Machines, there's a Steampunk project in France called Les Machines De L'ile and it's basically like an amusement park.

Slide 6 - Here we have 'The Great Elephant' who is 12 meters high and is made from 48 tons of steal. People can ride him and go on a little tour and he moves like a real elephant and squirts water from his trunk too. It's like being on the 4th floor of a moving house apparently and seats like 50 people.

Slide 7 - Then there's 'The Marine World Carousel' which is almost 25 meters high and 22 meters of diameter. It's a sculpture dedicated to the sea. It has three levels - the seabeds, the depths and the surface and it's for children and they have levers and pedals to control features of what they're riding.

Slide 8 - They have a workshop where they make these machines. The builders are a company called 'La Machine' who are a street Theatre company.

Slide 9 - And finally we have The Machine Gallery where they put new machines. There's a heron bird which carries people and flies them over the gallery and they have mechanical plants and creatures next to real ones.