This haute couture season makes me think of John Currin’s paintings. “They connect with a quality once sought-after by painters and latterly much neglected: spirit. A sick spirit, undoubtedly, but a spirit nonetheless,” writes Rosanna McLaughlin. Like Currin’s work, the best couture accepts contradiction. It can be exquisite and ridiculous, sincere and artificial, disciplined yet irrational. It acknowledges that fashion, at its highest level, is not about solving problems or delivering moral lessons. It’s about expressing something deeply human through surfaces that are anything but shallow. The embroidery, the silhouette, the impossible construction – these become evidence of desire made tangible. Perhaps that is what couture is uniquely capable of preserving today: spirit. Sometimes elegant, sometimes unsettling, occasionally excessive, but unmistakably alive.
This is exactly what Matthieu Blazy achieved with his sophomore couture collection for Chanel. It immediately made me think of the American painter’s work and his indulgence in fantasy. Blazy was interested in fairy tales, too, but also in modern ones – the stories women tell themselves today. READ MY FULL REVIEW HERE.
Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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