Soft Geometries: Fashion, Architecture, and NYC’s Garment District

A felt structure by Gabi Schillig

The Van Alen Institute is hosting a discussion tonight between designer Yeohlee Teng and architect Calvin Tsao on the relationship between fashion and architecture, civic identity and public spaces with regards to the possible rezoning of New York City’s Garment District. This program is in conjunction with their current exhibition by outgoing Van Alen Fellow Gabi Schillig, titled "Public Receptors: Beneath the Skin". Stay tuned to Fashion Projects for an interview with Gabi regarding her work in attempting to mediate the relationship between private users and public spaces using her portable, detachable felt structures.

The program tonight is from 6:30 – 8:30pm at the Van Alen Institute, 30 West 22nd Street (between 5th and 6th Avenues) 6th Floor. $8 for non-members, payable at the door; free for Van Alen Institute members and one guest. RSVP required to rsvp@vanalen.org.

Christian Joy at AVA

Christian Joy, "Nightmare Catcher," 2009.

Another designers’ exhibition, which occurred in conjunction with fashion week, was Christian Joy’s The Visitors Must be Amused. It took place at Audio Visual Arts—a new gallery in the East Village, where it will be on view unti March 8. The premise for the exhibition is that Joy disposed of nine years of left-over, unwanted material in her studio and repurposed it into extravagent representations of female beings through garments. In a further twist, Joy based each sculpture/creation on descriptions given to her by a friend or family member who, in turn, had to incorporate Joy’s finished piece in their own photograph or creation. Among the collaborators were the Yeah Yeah Yeahs's Karen O and Nick Zinner.

The descriptions gave range to an array of seemingly disparate results running the gamut of a Thierry Mugler–inspired cyborg suit to a black body suit. The latter was reinterpreted into a funny night scene, where the black-clad wearer became reminiscent of the early-twentieth century proto catwoman Irma Vep.

One of the costumes involved a video projection, which seemed to be a commentary on a turn-of-the-century trans-Atlantic voyage, while what was perhaps the most interesting costume was “Nightmare Catcher”—a vaguely scarecrow-like attire made of stripes of burlap and gingham fabric.

It’s great to see more and more small exhibitions of experimental New York designers popping up around the city—a trend which will hopefully continue!

Francesca

Christian Joy, The Visitors Must be Amused, Installation View

Slow and Steady Wins the Race at Kiosk

Slow and Steady Wins the Race's Installation at Kiosk (February 14, 2009)

It’s interesting to see designers choosing to have exhibitions, as opposed to shows or presentations, in conjunction with fashion week. The New York–based conceptual designer Mary Ping of Slow and Steady Wins the Race organized a small exhibition for the 21st installation of her line. It was organized along the lines of a birthday party with piñatas and birthday cakes. The saccharine display seemed to do away with garments all together, but, at a closer look, one could see clothes dangling from one of the smashed piñatas. Each piñata actually contained Ping’s conceptually evolved and witty garments, yet their contents remained secret, but to the lucky buyer.

Slow and Steady’s production of slow, high-quality design at affordable prices seems perfect for our contemporary times and well aligned with the mission of Kiosk—the exhibition space/design store that hosted the event.

Symposium at FIT

Cue Club, Notting Hill, 1966, Photo by: Charlie Phillips (from the V&A exhibition Black British Style).

FIT is currently hosting its annual fashion symposium. Organized by Valerie Steele cuncurrently with the Gothic: Dark Glamour exhibition, this year's symposium is dedicated to the topic of subcultural styles.

Among the speakers are Carol Tulloch, who completed extensive research on black British style and curated an exhibition on the topic at the V&A in 2004, and the anthropologist Ted Polhemus, known for his pioneering theories on subcultural styles. A special space seems to be occupied by Japanese style, with three speakers--Yuniya Kawamura, Hiroshi Narumi and Tiffany Godoy--discussing various aspects of Japanese subcultures and street styles.

Please visit the FIT site for a complete schedule.

Weird Beauty: Fashion Photography Now

Tim Walker, "Magic World," Vogue Italia, January 2008.

The International Center of Photography just opened four exhibitions to inaugurate their “2009 Year of Fashion,” including the contemporary Weird Beauty: Fashion Photography Now. Surveying recent fashion photography, the show includes magazine spreads alongside actual photographic prints. As noted by New York Times art critic Roberta Smith in her review of the show, the majority of the magazines featured are either European or Japanese, with the lone American titles, W magazine and the New York Times. Smith’s candid admittance that she was unfamiliar with most of these foreign publications was striking: Considering the importance of some of the titles in fashion circles (i.e. Vogue Italia and Purple), it goes to show the strict divide between fashion and art in the States. Perhaps the fashion exhibitions at the IPC will contribute to narrowing this divide.

Weird Beauty’s inclusion of the actual magazine spreads makes for an interesting contextualization of the photographs and gives its due to stylists and make-up artists, yet one would have hoped for more of the actual prints to be included. After all, an avid reader of fashion magazines would have seen a good number of these photographs on the printed page, and the museum could provide a different perspective on the work through blown-up prints. In fact, the photographs whose prints were included alongside the spreads stole the show. Particularly interesting were works which originally had been published in Vogue Italia. A black and white photograph by Tim Walker looks diaphanous, as it explores the transparency of fabrics like organza and tulle. It also points to the notion of prostethically altered bodies via a round egg-shaped ruffle “dress” worn by one of the models and a fork-like device (reminiscent of a prosthesis) that partially holds up the other model in the frame.

Deborah Turbeville, "Charlotte Gainsbourg" Vogue Italia

Other photographs that stand out are a portrayal of Charlotte Gainsbourg by Deborah Turbeville—an established photographer with an enviably long career—also in Vogue Italia. The shot is reminiscent of a turn-of-the-century Chaplinesque heroine. Also of notice are Surrealist-inspired photographs by Sara Van Der Beek for W Magazine, as well as the lighly disturbing photograph by Richard Burbridge, a close-up on an eye doused in candy pink liquid, and aptly titled Pink Eye.

Richard Burbridge, Pink Eye, 2008.

Francesca Granata