| Square & Share MemorAbles and FuturAbles: the future of the past in contemporary fashion Paolo Ferrarini May 2000  • Intro • MemorAbles and... • The art of the Occasion |
The end of the century and the millennium prompts us all to take stock and for the fashion world the 20th century was certainly a period rich in stimuli and changes, phenomena that we are now able to interpret with a certain objective detachment. Over the decades a series of different attitudes and canons determined the way clothing was perceived and made. The end of the century only confirmed what had been happening since the beginning of recorded history, namely, that fashion was created essentially for the upper classes and that, as it gradually filtered down the social ladder, one tended to witness a process of normalization and simplification. Beginning with the period following World War II, however, one began noticing that strong fashion impulses were also beginning to emerge from the bottom of the social ladder, emanating spontaneously from the street (in particular, they were inspired by the so-called “youth- culture”) and continuing on to influence the way young people dressed and behaved. This revolutionary grassroots phenomenon also gradually began to affect the realm of prêt-à-porter fashion and even the sacred precincts of Haute Couture (although only in terms of the formal aspect).
Today the true creators of fashion are the shoppers with the vast potential they have in terms of selecting forms, colors, fabrics and prices. More than ever before, they have the ability to seek out clothing items and mix and match them as they please, creating a personal wardrobe, a potpourri that is increasingly intended to allow for maximum levels of personalization / customization and individual expression. Every outfit is a theatrical production, an arrangement that communicates something, a configuration of pieces that says something about the person wearing it. The selection is not entirely rational, but every time a person selects the parts, in terms of the clothing and accessories, he or she intends to wear, the result is always a meaningful, “greater” whole. When we get dressed we have to take certain things into consideration, like the occasion (or the occasions) that will be dealt with in that particular attire, the people we expect of meet, the impression we want to give of ourselves and the practical requirements of comfort and performance.
Even the clothing manufacturers are beginning to behave in this manner, i.e. present themselves like people (or celebrities) with their own very personal identity which, instead of suggesting that the consumers should “buy clothing made by ……”, sends a more subtle message that they should “dress like …… ”. Indeed, the fashion industry operates at a maddeningly hectic pace in order to cater to an unquenchable thirst for novelty that could have fatal consequences at every turn. Striving to work in terms of lasting concepts like identity is the only way to render yourself recognizable in this business. The fashion industry learned this strategy from the consumers, the “targets” who are increasingly proving to be very skilled “archers”, i.e. extremely savvy when it comes to finding garments and composing them to meet their own personal needs.
The only real goal of fashion is almost always originality and today you are more likely to find this feature in the freewheeling way mass-produced items are mixed and matched than in just one, unique piece of clothing. Personal style, of course, is something that can vary and it depends on the occasion, the time of day and things like the wearer’s mood, in an ongoing process of ritual “personal performances”.
Concepts like flip-flopping from one TV channel to another, the fashion metro, style surfing and navigating the Internet are very helpful when it comes to gaining a better understanding of how style operates on the contemporary clothing landscape. As a matter of fact, the most fertile contemporary manifestations of creativity are achieved by being able to strike a precarious balance between the myriad style inspirations coming from below and from above. Both the major designers and emerging young fashion talents freely admit drawing inspiration from the street, although they filter the crude input through the fine mesh of the fashion industry’s cultural, technical and communicative patrimony, transforming the raw material into popular culture. The prophet when it comes to this way of perceiving fashion is Elio Fiorucci, a regular fashion DJ ever since the late 60’s and a masterful interpreter of the pop culture. Similar to Ontani and Warhol, he always proved himself to be a master at combining images, a ruthless desecrater of contemporary icons, a bold trailblazer in quest of distant and different realms, intrepidly navigating both space and time, giving rise to a evocative mix that is the result of a reconciliation of opposites: luxury and poverty, past and future, here and elsewhere. Ever since the late 60’s his fashion creations have demonstrated that it is “the man on the street” who decides how to organize the displays of his own personal collection.
Fashion, by nature, constitutes a sort of apotheosis of the cyclical concept of time, an endless parade of what has been seen before, striking a poignant balance between remake and revival. In today’s world you could safely assert that one of the most beaten paths in terms of innovation is navigated is reverse gear. Odd as it may seem, by going back in time one is able to find the future, remembering that, just a little further on, lies the present.
The widespread popularity of vintage clothing only serves to confirm this sensibility. In the Unites States the secondhand-market phenomenon is on the rise and in Italy, in addition to traditional used-clothing stores, one can also find a great many boutiques that display certain, carefully selected vintage items right alongside cutting-edge designer attire. The most enterprising manufacturing companies have lost no time in putting some of their old models back into production, the things young people have been finding in flea markets or their parents’ trunks in the attic. The celebrated three stripes of Adidas can be found on T-shirts while rummaging through the market stalls, but they also adorn the polos neatly hung in the most sophisticated sporting-goods stores. The thing both categories have in common is a certain used look that can be obtained either the old-fashioned natural way, or by means of special aging treatments provided by the manufacturer. Levi’s has come out with a line called, Vintage Clothing, featuring reissues of special historic items that they commission contemporary artists to interpret in their own way. The Frankie Morello label has also made a name for itself as a manufacturer of “new used” items, i.e. new fashions that have been inspired by the craze for used clothing and actually made from unfinished, worn materials. Tom Ford is the master antiquarian for the Gucci label, with his ability, season after season, to bring back the firm’s historic items, the fabrics and the patterns that made fashion history for this company, all masterfully mixed with new, frequently highly innovative, items. Valentino, Yves Saint Laurent, Christian Dior and Givenchy have all left their mark on 20th-century fashion history and today, more than ever, they are continuing to reissue their most famous items unaltered. And they are not simply catering to their old-guard customers this way, but also reaching out to a receptive younger audience. In the streets of cities throughout the world you can identify the members of a “global tribe”, young and not-so-young people who are eager to rediscover the values of elegance, of taking care of themselves and clothing that’s not new. These people are the MemorAbles, individuals capable of memory who are rediscovering the legacy of the past and relaunching it as a prospective from which to view the future. They are not traditionalist and they are not “neo-“ anything. To them the past can be absolutely any historical period. With their clothing, the books they read, the art they prefer, the music they make and listen to, they can project themselves vicariously into past centuries, or just as easily into the recent Eighties.
These projections into the past also throw light on visions of the future. The “smooth” transition we experienced into the third millennium has given the lie to all those apocalyptic visions and doomsday forecasts, making way for more ironic, reassuring science-fiction scenarios. Technology has also become much friendlier, proving itself to be capable of establishing a peaceful and convenient coexist with the very clothes we wear. Once again, one can explore this sensibility by simply looking around and observing what is happening on the street, where one will discover a whole new global tribe that is fond of things like reflective fabrics, round shapes, pure white and super high-tech accessories, as well as fabrics with a distinctly natural appearance, but artificially modified on the invisible molecular level and capable of delivering extremely high performance in terms of easy care and protection. Another group of people, the FuturAbles, have been eager to embrace the stimuli emanating from the development of wearable computers, the development of technology that is close enough to the human body to be perfectly integrated into clothing and, in certain extreme cases, actually contained in the fibers of said clothing. The evocative potential of this new type of technology has been exploited by Prada Sport in their most recent advertising campaign, featuring visions in “Pradarama” of a not-too-distant future. According to the kids, the clothing designed by people like Mozzillo, Marithé+François Girbaud and Tom Van Lingen would make perfect costumes for the next inevitable series of the unending Star Trek episodes. Intergalactic star ships and extraterrestrials are already getting ready to invade the movie theaters, art galleries and bookstores. Electronic music can no longer be considered a separate, distinct genre; it has become a transversal phenomenon, something that is played to promote meditation, to liven up the crowds in discotheques and soothe nerves in shopping centers. And just a few, short years ago it was only imaginable as the weird soundtrack to some made-for-TV sci-fi thriller.
» by Paolo Ferrarini, may 2000, from Artbeat 2. Arte narrativa videoclip, Castelvecchi Arte, Rome 2000
     |
 |
 |
 |