That's the autumn / winter wardrobe sorted then.
Celine is without a doubt my favourite show from Paris this season. Watching long limbed, Nitrogen fixated*, girls strutting up and down the catwalk in beautiful clothes provides just the same aesthetic effect on me as a Gerhard Richter. It works a similar sort of, albeit transitory, magic.
The palate used by Philo throughout this capsule collection is astonishing. Amongst a monochrome landscape of clever cuts, shocks of acidic and muted colours clashed sublimely, and delivered by blocks and lines created an abstracted geometry that proved tactile by an engagement with materials including furs and leathers. As one colour met another, and one surface nuzzled into another, the shift in materials reminded me of Bassets Liquorice Allsorts – the black iquorice kisses the yellow diced coconut. Very tasty stuff indeed.
Footnote: As you may know Philo is married to Max Wigram, the gallerist, so contemporary art and inspiration must be in abundance in that home, and I don’t know about you but I am itching to get in there and take an inventory of their art collection.
*Nitrogen fixation occurs naturally in the air by means of lightning
Quotation, Lucinda Chambers sums up the Celine autumn/winter 2012/13 show.
Drool.
This month’s UK Vogue (March) is HOT. Spring fashion by Mario Sorrenti, Mario Testino, Alasdair McLellan and David Sims. Oh, and ‘Shop at Moschino’ if you can ladies, the ad has convinced me.
This season it’s Miu Miu. A girl sits very still and very quiet, her flesh breeds a sweet sweat that licks her dark candy curls. A snug pearl necklace pinches her pale throat increasing her heat. There’s little in her head but glittery fantasies, she knows what she wants and it’s pink, shiny and just a little bit putrid.
I am a loyal devotee of Vogue. It was the first glossy that I adopted as a teenager and I can’t recall ever missing out on a single issue. I don’t always think it gives great content, but I always insist on being informed. Love magazine, another from Condé Nasts stable, launched their iPad app a month or so again, so it’s timely that Vogue should do so now. So, as a woman in her mid thirties with a strong background in print publishing and an avid consumer of visual culture, the simple question is, how will I choose to continue my subscription to Vogue?
iPad app please. No question. That sexy light little tablet full of all my informational needs, and now with Vogue ‘extras’ can fit very neatly into my Céline bag thank you very much, and no more unnecessary paper in my life. Neat. (I’m a bit of paper Nazi these days. Only use paper if you need to, or if you’re making a meal of it, and if it’s fresh – see blog entry on NY Art Book Fair.) Paper and printing was the essential medium for Vogue and their sponsors to carry their monthly message, but these can now be supported digitally so why not? I don’t think we’ll loose anything to aesthetics here. My guess would be that much of Vogue’s market could afford an iPad right now, those who can’t it’s simply a matter of time, so how long before the print ‘edition’ becomes extinct? But with people wanting information immediately, how long before the concept of the ‘edition’ or the ‘periodical’ is done away with and the mag simply morphs into Vogue.com? This also begs the foggy question of the digital archive, how does / will that work? But of course going digital presents many opportunities for Vogue and the advertisers who I imagine are rubbing their immaculately manicured hands together as I write; imagine being able to flick though the magazine tap on a pair of shoes and ‘adding to basket’? Conspicuous consumption is hence immensely incorrigible and bound to give the economy a boost. Digitally the capitalists couldn’t be better placed; for the consumer blink and you’ve just dropped thousands on a bag after being mesmerised by an ad coming to life inviting you to join their gang. Careful now
Fashion Films are mostly naff from what I’ve seen, but we’re finally starting to see the emergence of some decent videos from the big fashion houses. The Show, a short to promote Lanvin for H&M and directed by Mike Figgis (below), is super cute and expertly captures the spirit of the luxury brand. But I’m here mainly in praise of Stefano Pilato.
The creative director of YSL is showing himself to be, not only an incredible designer, but a master of media; he knows exactly how to exploit it and deliver his vision. The Manifestos celebrate print and surface, even offering secret stickers of a jubilant Schiffer; and he has just released my current favourite of the fashion shorts, a super slick number directed by his close collaborators Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin. You can view it here, but be warned if you’re female you’ll need a strong sense of self when confronting the nuclear vision of womanhood that strides down the stairs towards you and if you’re a man, please, for the benefit of all of us, remember it’s a fantasy and I doubt she’d be interested in you anyway
Fashion Films are mostly naff from what I’ve seen, but we’re finally starting to see the emergence of some decent videos from the big fashion houses. The Show, a short to promote Lanvin for H&M and directed by Mike Figgis (below), is super cute and expertly captures the spirit of the luxury brand. But I’m here mainly in praise of Stefano Pilato.
The creative director of YSL is showing himself to be, not only an incredible designer, but a master of media; he knows exactly how to exploit it and deliver his vision. The Manifestos celebrate print and surface, even offering secret stickers of a jubilant Schiffer; and he has just released my current favourite of the fashion shorts, a super slick number directed by his close collaborators Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin. You can view it here, but be warned if you’re female you’ll need a strong sense of self when confronting the nuclear vision of womanhood that strides down the stairs towards you and if you’re a man, please, for the benefit of all of us, remember it’s a fantasy and I doubt she’d be interested in you anyway
“I know what women want,” and what do they want? “they want to be beautiful”.
Storyville, Valentino, The Last Emperor, 2010-11
The Shining
Balenciaga, Spring / Summer, 2009
Kraftwerk