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Closing Notes / Reflective Thoughts 

The combined dissertation spans a total of around 80 pages including the image booklet. 

Within these pages are a bricolage of thoughts from myself and creatives that coherently compounds my lived experience with the medium of fashion both as a practitioner and a writer. The greatest experience whilst writing this is the contained physical manifestation of these experiences for which I can revisit and reference when constructing what one can hope to be, more complex and in depth writings on the subject. 

The challenges I faced, I feel largely centred around previous experience and scale. Spending many months with an ever growing body of writing makes it hard with someone such as myself, being mildly dyslexic with a practical rather than a non academic preparatory education, to quantify and manage such a large body of writing. In the future I will undoubtably apply the research and writing methodologies to improve productivity and concisness in forthcoming writing. 

Overall I feel immensely proud of the outcome but wish I had more time and less word limitations to fully encompass the essence of what I aimed to communicate but I imagine this is a feeling native to the ‘handing in’ of all works writing or otherwise. 

Hugo 

BOU15451570 

BA Culture Criticism Curation 

Central Saint Martins 

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Acknowledgements and Thanks 

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Final Cuts

Regrettably I had to cut the following writing from my final case study on Rick Owens. I don't feel the content is unnecessary and given a high word count would have enjoyed expanding a few of the Ideas introduced here 

Owen’s work, similar to Rei Kawakubo’s exists in the degrees of separation between the body and corporeal space. This space in Owens however Is relative, relative to the current world relative to the current codes of taste and cultural capital.To best illustrate the definition of this space, see the excerpt below is an essay by Berger, again on Romain Lorquet, discussing the place of the uninterpretable (here meaning abstract) sculpture: 

“As the division of labour increased, art, like every other discipline began to differentiate more and more sharply. Idealisation was one of its forms of differentiation. Sculptors competed with one and other to carve the perfect mouth, the mouth which was perfectly and only itself. The more they succeed, the greater the distinction became between the mouth and hole in the earth. Everything was divided in to its type. Every distinction and distance became measurable. And empty space was born.”

This ‘empty space’ typifies Rick Owens and inhabits his work. Fashion by and large spearheaded its obsession with ideal human, the features, measurements and personality was subjected to seasonal refinement. Sculpture however, (including sculptural fashion) replicated the same ambition albeit in the opposing direction, seeking the ultimate non-form, the furthest abstraction from which to declare victory over the natural world.

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Design and Preferred Layout references 

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Scenario by Merce Cunningham 

-The must fluid realisation of a synthesised communication of concept in sculpture and fashion relative to movement 

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Lous Stopped for the British Councils Fashion Paper #4 

- Fashion as installation establishes the artistic intersections between fashion and art. Unfortunately the introduction of a lot of this thinking into my paper would warrant and lengthy distinction in regards to sculpture / installation 

- The writing of Stoppard has been influential to the paper so I thought it best to use her work like a platform to transition the introductory writing to garment and the gallery 

- Iris Van Harpen and Hussein Chalayan are two luminaries that im regretful couldn't be presented in case studies as their work established the framing for artistic discussion the medium 

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Scanned references. 

-Attached are the physical accompaniments / evidence to important body of writing in the dissertation, they are here to allow for added context and understanding if needed. 

-All have been mentioned and cited both in the paper and in the journal prior to this 

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Cut Content part two 

- Due to structuring issues I haven't been able include all the case studies I had ambitiously set out to include, as such a lot of thoughts and some research won't make it into the final iteration of my dissertation. As such I've decided to include any cut content here, in my journal, so that it can communicate the process and thought evolution of the final chapter and the themes that would be tackled had the paper been longer or perhaps angled in a different direction.

- This section at times refers back to the initial writings of Miller. Mainly addressing the ways in which minority, specifically African American communities, are seen in relation to the consumption and engagement with garments. Using Tom Sachs and Jayson Musson as an example I attempt to address the use of garments as means to democratise the discussion around cultural heritage and iconography

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Cut Content part one 

- Due to structuring issues I haven't been able include all the case studies I had ambitiously set out to include, as such a lot of thoughts and some research won't make it into the final iteration of my dissertation. As such I've decided to include any cut content here, in my journal, so that it can communicate the process and thought evolution of the final chapter and the themes that would be tackled had the paper been longer or perhaps angled in a different direction. 

- The first cut case study is of Sterling Ruby and his exhibition ‘workwear’ Ruby is widely popular artist and transitioned prominently into the sphere of fashion due to working with Raf Simons  

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sign posting / re referring

In an aim to have a small body of text that represents my wider writings I attempted a two paragraph summary that I will constantly re refer to and constantly try to sign post going into the editing phase of many sections of the paper 

-Over the course of this paper will declare the garment as cultural objects capable of affecting our society through critique and re imagings of our own human form. In the process we will be addressing the modern art ‘gallery’ and how it can be used as an alternative platform for garments. We will also address fashion and the garments separation from consumerisms supported by establishing the historical context of garments and its relationship to class politics gender and societal norms. Eventually culminating in examples in which garments have been used to present radical new interrogations of the human form that will be argued to influence the canon of cultural history as we move forward.

The material evidence and supported thinking for this argument is largely fragmented as this topic, due to its constantly changing nature, has made it hard for academics to publish books or writings on topics before they change and the existing material is made redundant. Leaving the medium with an outdated frame of academic reference. However this paper not only aims to revise and revisit many starting points made by fashion thinkers but establish an awareness of the gaps in scholarship.

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Re thinking Margiela and his tenure at Hermes

- Looking back on Margiela paragraph, after reading the catalogue for the mode museum exhibition ‘marginal the Hermes years’ that a lot of what I argue is supported by the ethics and design practices he championed whilst working for them up until 2003 

- due to the designer never giving interviews its difficult to support suppositions on his true intentions aside from the obvious visual cues. However the shows curator who had many interactions with Margiela spoke candidly about putting the show together, perhaps an interview will prove a interesting reference or supporting statement for a proposition on anti consumerist garment making.

-the images above also strike an interesting mental parallel to Milroy. Perhaps because they are both shapely renderings of traditional woman silhouettes but employed in different environments e.g the runway and the gallery. It would be interesting to tie both of these together in the closing chapter and perhaps comment on Margielas contested crowning in recent retrospective writings as an early feminist designer and precursor to todays post gender design landscape in conceptual fashion 

http://www.dazeddigital.com/fashion/article/35275/1/the-untold-story-of-martin-margielas-time-at-hermes-antwerp-momu-exhibition

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Notes from a scheduled performance by Lisa Milroy: 

- Milroy, who stands in the centre attached image, guided a performer around the gallery wearing one of the dresses in the ‘party of one piece 

- the painting shoes 1985 is done with a treatment of paint that evokes movement, as If they are still moving with the owner once taken off, perhaps because in her fiction they haven't been ? that is to say the two entities are inseparable. 

- the break taking 20 metre canvas depicts an interesting scene of projectors summoning the associations with memory. It is an important usage of paint as it identifies the world or setting for which these garments exist within 

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Exhibition. Here and There; Paintings by Lisa Milroy 

Lisa Milroy graduated from both St Martins and Goldsmiths, 

Here work continuously references the ‘everyday’ object. It in part is about manipulating the the literal and metaphorical fabric that comprises the objects we ourselves are familiar with. This in part questions the extent to which we understand the temporality of each object. 

In reference to dress, Milroy uses the mode of memory and familiarity to address the garment. She takes what we know of the garment, here meaning its purpose and its function, our memory. At the same she takes our comfort, our presumed understanding born from familiarity. She takes both of these and collectively challenges by movement by deconstruction and by assemblage, the the distance she can contort the garment in the viewers minds eye. 

For my writing I was fascinated by the central installation ‘party of one’ in which 60s cocktail dresses are lined up, hung and regimented. They are defined as dresses despite clear sculptural connotations. This intrigue widened when I came to notice Milroy’s repeated re use of womanly garments and perhaps iconography ? 

If it can be assumed these in animate objects can, as vehicles, convey just as I have convey the fashion runway does, an ideal futuristic feminine form then it can be said to be symbolic of a synthesis between sculpture and garment ? 

- additional research to follow once I've finished reading the catalogue 

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Thoughts and research on the Rick Owens ‘penis show’ 

-To conclude my final case study about the garment and the human form I'm still absolute on using Owens but perhaps reducing this to a single example as opposed to upwards of 3. 

- The 2015 show ‘sphinx’ is a fascinating deconstruction of the ideas and monuments of toxic masculinity as well as a testament to renaissance and greek depictions of modest manhood. 

- The theme of manhood also follows and concludes the initial writings on womanhood in regards to the Lisa Milroy exhibition 

- Below are links used to source information and research about the show 

http://showstudio.com/collection/rick_owens_paris_menswear_a_w_2015/lou_stoppard_reports_on_the_rick_owens_show

https://www.vox.com/2015/1/24/7874497/visible-penis-explained-rick-owens

https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-ancient-greek-sculptures-small-penises

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Thoughts on the sculptural depictions of the elegant sculptural proletariate by Craig Green 

- perhaps the initial segment garment and remembered function can transition to the garment and the gallery section by discussion to a minor degree of depth, the sculptural practice of Green in relation to his approach to the theatre of runway 

- the below interviews are essential to understanding the importance and permanence of his sculptural endeavours 

http://showstudio.com/collection/craig_green_london_menswear_s_s_2015/lou_stoppard_reports_on_the_craig_green_show

http://www.dazeddigital.com/fashion/article/36310/1/craig-green-on-ss18-sculptures-pissing-off-the-daily-mail

https://s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/back-of-the-envelope/ADF+Papers+4/Fashion+Paper+4+FINAL.pdf

http://1granary.com/central-saint-martins-fashion/david-curtis-ring-man-behind-craig-greens-sculptures/#!

http://the-talks.com/interview/craig-green/

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Thoughts on what the garment means to minority communities

Recently, In my sociological research into the ways in which garments are perceived on different people, I noticed a disparity in the way say latino or African American individuals are thought to value. clothes. It is off not the a lot of cultural importance is placed around the material culture of clothes and as such has become synonymous with the lifestyle for which produces said desire. 

I noticed that infantilisation of the importance of clothes by the hegemonic cultural elite is similar to the pre victorian imposition of fashion as vacuous towards woman in the earlier century

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Rick Owens would present an interesting opportunity to close the final chapter of my dissertation. 

His word tethers on the cutting edge of synthesised fashion and sculpture. His work on the level on consumption is quoted as being memento the meta physical moment of display he realises in his theatrical runway works. 

His work also has heavily connotations to fetish and lgbtq culture, that although codified, houses a unique and important narrative for those it is relative too. 

His most recent fw17 collection and more ss16 ss14 shows are perhaps the height of his extravagant displays, whilst being the most profound cirques of the medium. 

His work is also interesting when described in conjecture with more abstract sculptural forms