1970s-1990s The Japanese Avant-garde

[Deleted member 7575]

...that is a whole other discussion which we've had here before and seem to keeep having...there are varying opinions on whether fashion is or can be art...

apparently issey thinks of what he does as art...
don't know about yohji or rei...i don't think they do really...i think rei is too practical for that and yohji is too modest...

I think Issey likes the idea that his work is considered to be art. But I think the way he regards himself as an artist is in a very conceptual way. I mean that his true artistic expression is not completely in the clothes but in the ideas behind them. He really does have this amazing dream about people coming together in harmony and making their lives better and easier. He celebrates youth, life, and people. He tries to achieve this through clothes. His clothing designs and his industrial research can be seen as effects of his artistic pursuits that by relationship have become art. Even the scientific engineering research he carries on is in a way art.

For Issey the clothes or the object are not the actual works of art, the real ART is how people interact with it, how it makes them feel emotionally and physically. It is a verb not a noun. This is at least what I gathered from when I talked to him and what he said about his own work. I am not sure if he considers himself an artist. I know he never earnestly considered himself a fashion designer...that he said himself. He seemed to have some resentment towards the industry and was relieved to be free of it. Issey said fashion was just a podium to make what he felt he needed to make. When asked during the group dicussion with him whether he was a fashion designer, industrial designer, or an artist he replied: "I just make things"

I think perhaps that if you asked Yohji and Rei the same question they would have a similar answer.

 

[softgrey]

i said that to someone who asked if i was an artist once...
no...i said...i just make things...

the reply?...
'that's what an artist does'...

something to think about...

 

[softgrey]

I don't really know that much about the nature of the Belgian movement - I'd like to know more...to me, now, Dries & Margiela & Demeulmeester all seem really different. How were/are they 'connected' aesthetically?

we need to start a thread on the belgians...!!
this is becoming quite clear... ...

...i can say from experience that after having visited antwerp...it made some sense...just from the feel of the place...

i can speak about it from an historical point of view and where they fit into the big picture...but that's where i would stop...i tend to prefer not to know too much about a designer's personal history...i would rather let the clothes speak for themselves...so i relate to designers based on their collections rather than their personal lives...i'm only just finding out most things about the japanese avante garde right now...even though i've followed them for years...so most of my knowledge is from direct experience and personal observation...

i am definitley not the expert here...i am extremely familiar with the clothes and the collections...but i haven't read as much as some others here...i know faust and maybe scott have books on belgian fashion...
maybe one of them will start a thread and shed some light...or at least recommend some reading material...

 

[nqth]

I think you are right about the artism behind making clothes. The ideas, concepts that lead to the clothes are truly inventive. They are questioning the ideas of genders, beauty, the body... and some times the way one sees the world. I think the Japanese really make clothes that never have been made before. Clothes made from ideas that are not connected with, well, clothing.

I don't know much recent works of Miyake and Yamamoto. From what I have seen, I think Rei Kawakubo is the only one who still experiments with her aesthetics. I think that she is the one who still moving forwards.

I'd not say that she is pratical. I think she is the one who always looks and goes one step further. In doing bussiness, too. Look at the way she builds her stores, making new lines, radical perfumes, colaboration with Corso Como in Tokyo, Guerrillas and the latest Dover Market. Who in the fashion bussiness does more projects than she does. Comme is a very very strong and energetic company:-)

 

[Deleted member 7575]

i said that to someone who asked if i was an artist once...
no...i said...i just make things...

the reply?...
'that's what an artist does'...

something to think about...

engineers, industrial designers, and carpenters also make things as well.

 

[softgrey]

what's your point mutterlein?...

...

 

[Deleted member 7575]

what's your point mutterlein?...

...

my point was that the person who responded to you may have been correct in saying "that is what an artist does" but it still does not mean one is actually an artist. When you or Issey say "I make things" to me it implies that what you make is more than art. It's more the design, or its more than whatever exactly it is being made. I don't like being termed an artist even though that is what I am studying to be. I'd like to think that what I make isn't just art and can't be organized in that way.

 

[softgrey]

well...what i make can't be termed anything else......
and i've come to terms with the term......
doesn't mean i'm any good...but it is true...

 

[Deleted member 7575]

well...what i make can't be termed anything else......
and i've come to terms with the term......
doesn't mean i'm any good...but it is true...

we should just make up our own word!

 

[travolta]

ok this is slightly off topic...but since we are talking about the nature of an artist here's a quote by bob dylan:

"My father, who was plain speaking and straight talking said, 'Isn't an artist a fellow who paints?' when told by one of my teachers that his son had the nature of an artist. It seemed I'd always been chasing after something, anything that might lead me into some more lit place, some unknown land downriver. I had not the vaguest notion of the broken world I was living in, what society could do with you."

something to think about

 

[orlem]

I forgot to say that I take this dress as a sign of Rei's genius .

She has taken the traditional English country yokel's smock and totally transmuted it into a miracle of an avant-garde dress for a woman - revolutionary , but totally wearable .

Agreed, and does anybody know whether there is there a title to the photograph, or the collection this is from? Taking "hillbilly" and turning it into high fashion, I love it.

 

[Scott]

They are quite different from each other. I think the thread that really connects all of them is that sense of craft and their sense of integrity and soul. Emotions are a main source of inspiration for all of them too. That to me is even more sexy

 

[travolta]

you're such a romantic scott

 

[Scott]

I agree Mutterlein. I don't believe in bluntly calling something one does as art. For one,its extremely pretentious in this context AND frankly art belongs on a pedestal not a human being. A person can inject those elements into whatever their doing but at the end of the day one must want to wear it. Fashion is not art...it's creative in it's process but generally designer's are often faced with figuring out proportions and shapes to cover a body. Whether that is experimental or more conservative,it has to made for the person. At least that's my view on the matter.

 

[Scott]

you're such a romantic scott

 

[travolta]

^unfortunately fashion usually isn't democratic...comme des garcons, and dries van noten clothing is not affordable for the masses...so i think most high end fashion is pretenious in a way...and the term art will always be debated...i think true art is defined as what miyake is doing-he kinda figured it out...

 

[Spacemiu]

some pictures from SIX , the Comme des Garcosn magazine

 

[Spacemiu]

Comme Parfum Adds

 

[droogist]

...that is a whole other discussion which we've had here before and seem to keeep having...there are varying opinions on whether fashion is or can be art...

apparently issey thinks of what he does as art...
don't know about yohji or rei...i don't think they do really...i think rei is too practical for that and yohji is too modest...

I don't mean to beat a dead horse, but I seem to recall reading that when the question "Do you consider yourself an artist?" was posed to Rei, she replied, "No, I'm a dressmaker." I will try to find to exact reference...

 

[Spacemiu]

I'm pretty shr Yohji said he thought of him self as an artist. Rei seems to avoid the question and usually says she is a "clothes maker and buisness women". She did study art and philosophy