John Galliano S/S 2006 Paris

[fashionista-ta]

If you take a look at the Plus Size thread, I believe there's a Galliano sketch of a dress for a plus-size woman and possibly also some comments from him on the topic. I believe he's been thinking about dressing people who are out of the mainstream for some time.

Let's face the fact that Galliano chooses to look rather unusual himself. I wouldn't doubt that he identifies quite strongly with the "different."

I enjoyed this show ... and I didn't think it was funny. I think the whole range of humanity is beautiful, from white to black, small to large, and oftentimes we are more beautiful in contrast. If John intended to bring everyone's discomfort with deviation from the norm out into the open, I think he really succeeded

 

[Zazie]

I LOVE this. Galliano is the Toulouse-Lautrec of fashion. KUDOS! What a fascinating parade of diverse peoples with REAL personalities.

The way Galliano lovingly dressed them suggests that he was honest and embracing in his intentions. Imagine the amount of effort involved in cutting to fit and customise for each individual instead of the "standard" model figure. Imagine how much risk he is taking because which of his rich customer would identify with any of them? How much easier and less controversial it would have been to send up a run-of-the-mill pretty models show.

He will never take this risk for Dior, but for himself, yes. This has also made me more sympathetic to his past incomprehensible attempts to mar the good looks of models with garish make up. I don't think he is anti-women because the so-called "freaks" here are both male and female. After this show, I have a different view, I think he simply harbours a lot of nostalgia for the demi-monde he hearkened from before the recognition, fame and money.

 

[Zazie]

Again, I find myself agreeing with fashionista-ta. High-5!

 

[Lena]

I think the real difference between how JPG and Galliano uses "unusual" models is that JPG lets them model the actual clothes while Galliano uses them as props... Maybe I'm wrong, but that's the impression I get...

exactly my thoughts tott..

i fully respect clashing views on the 'ethics' of Galliano's show 'concept' and i'm very interested in hearing everyone's opinions but i still find the 'casting' rude and annoying

 

[Zazie]

I also find myself fantasizing about what the people around me who are not the obvious candidates for buying couture would look like in glammed up in Galliano away from the context of everyday life - the cleaning lady, the security guard, the bus driver, the fish seller - and the answer is very nice!

 

[birdofparadise]

from Galliano, Still The Master Showman, NYTimes, C. Horyn:

Somehow, in his own collection, Mr. Galliano found the need to do and say more. This was an enormously exhilarating show, and probably many people were unprepared (after Dior) for the gross humanity that filled his runway. It included dwarfs, child twins, adult twins, fat women, bewhiskered old men and models who figured in Mr. Galliano's purse-poor days in Paris, like the still-handsome Marie-Sophie Wilson.
The strength of the show was that it worked on several levels at once. There were the clothes: white cotton jackets and skirts veiled in thin, slightly creased black tulle; long coats made from petals of fabrics; and exquisite evening dresses in printed and tattered chiffon, a darker underlayer often giving a smudgy effect.

There was the humanistic quality of Paris expressed in the faces and body types of the models, most of whom are actors and musical performers. A young, well-respected French journalist asked me after the show what I thought of "the monsters." It took me a second to realize he meant "freaks," as if that makes a difference. He added that people sitting near him were laughing at Mr. Galliano's models.

The only reply to that is: Hearken to the pot calling the kettle black. Every day along the Rue de Rivoli you see fashion people going to the shows in their extravagant skirts and strange hats. You don't think ordinary citizens snigger a little? Who is the freak? The fashion world pays lip service to the notion of individuality, by putting white, blank-faced models on the runway. In Milan this season you rarely saw a black or Asian model. That is intolerable, not Mr. Galliano's fat women and twins.

Freedom is the most important thing to a designer. And at the end of the show Mr. Galliano made it clear he had not lost it. He sent out a stagehand with a marionette. It was a figure of Mr. Galliano with Mr. Galliano's long freakish hair, striking Mr. Galliano's macho poses. So who was really pulling the strings?

 

[Zazie]

Ha, ok, so it really was inspired by the demi-monde from his old days. I find it very Toulouse-Lautrec (not just Galliano's physical resemblance, heheh) - he who sketched the most interesting looking people from his milieu almost as caricature, with a very loving hand showing his affection for them. That affection is also apparent in this show, which is what makes it feel warm, sweet, and not at all exploitative. Oh, how he dresses them, like a fantastic eccentric dream.

I find the other big-name shows, Balenciaga and YSL, more surreal, showing perfectly dolled up models in extravagant concoctions that scream privilege and wealth and hearkening back to the Marie Antoinette moment before the guillotine dropped. Frankly, I'm not even sure that in these times of endless wars and disasters, even the rich and powerful want to be seen indulging in extravagant ostentatious display of their much fattened income.

Overall, the Paris shows were disappointing, as were the NY and Milan ones. What a strange season, as befitting the strange times. B)

 

[Urban Stylin]

i think we over indulge into somethings which makes us get different and sometimes unnecessary opinions. The midgets, giants, divorcees and old women all look happy and no one locked them up in a cage before coming to the show and they were given an opportunity to show that they are also normal human beings who can do what other people can do and also paid for it. If you look at the clothes everyone is wearing the same kinds of clothes, its not like the midgets are wearing some tacky animal skin to kind of complement the decor and lets face it in the normal world gemma and lily are quite different so the midgets the models and galliano all fit in perfectly.

 

[MaLkAv]

AWESOME SHOW!!!

It reminds me of Tod Browning's "Freaks".

Great job Mr. Galliano!

 

[mdankwah]

This is what makes fashion what it is, something we all hold our breaths for every season.

 

[tEMA]

Seriosuly imagine being at this show and not expecting to see something as spectacular as this!!! Its good he does something different to fashion shows.. And thats probably why everyone has so much respect for him!

Pure Genius

 

[lady stardust]

It´s always good to get reaction from people to make them feel SOMETHING even if its baaaad...Anyway, i LIKE it!!!

 

[butterfly]

So French! B)

 

[fashionista-ta]

Thanks for posting Cathy's review, birdofparadise--I think she really got it. The show begs the question--what is odd--actually? what is a freak--really? what is beautiful, in truth? Surely we all know that just because someone may look normal (whatever that is), doesn't mean s/he is.

Zazie, I love that you are dressing everyone you see a la Galliano

This is my favorite thing he's ever done.

 

[travolta]

in a way, this show is a much more streamlined version of all of his past shows. he's always creating these caricatures of different groups of people...didn't he do a homeless inspired collection? i agree with others that galliano gives fashion a taste of it's own medicine. thank god.

 

[MaLkAv]

For me it is that these people ARE hidden away from the public and that "celebrating" them...more like exploiting them for a fashion show spectacle seems a bit degrading. The clothing is obviously reminiscent of the era where such people were put on show as freaks and amusements and it's pretty much the same thing happening here. If Galliano really was celebrating the variety and differences in people he wouldn't present them as fashion show freaks in the process. Also his flair for exoticism (something discussed on this board before) is taken right out of a 1920's rascist cartoon with where some ethnic group is reduced to savages and their features over exaggerated.


This reminds me of the work of Diane Arbus who photographed many different people including dwarfs, the mentally challenged, and people with giantism. She would refer to them as "freaks" and portrayed them in less than flattering (and truthful) ways. Galliano hasn't allowed those people to be REAL people on that runway. Instead they have become even more "freaked" out and removed from our awareness...he's made them characters to laugh at not people to empathize with.

that's just my two cents.

I'm not referring to you Mutterlein, so please don't take it personal because I'm going to speak generally.

I would never laugh at them because I think they're all normal people.

I think it might have been striking (or even disturbing) to watch this show if I were a politically-correct moralist.

But the way my mind-set is, I think it's a brilliant criticism of our society...
People would do everything to look politically-correct, but then under her skin people will retain her "racism" (racism is maybe too harsh of a word... I wanted to say something like "distrust for people different from us").

They are just humans! That's what we all are. Simply!

Tod Browning did the same in the early 1900 with his "Freaks" movie, and reactions were almost the same... maybe some biases/preconceptions are impossible to remove from human way of thinking!


I hope I didn't make too many mistakes here, it was kinda difficult to translate what I wanted to say!
Also I hope nobody felt I have been rude to talk about "racism", because I know it's not the proper word here, but I couldn't find one better suited in my dictionary, so I apologize in advance!

 

[fashionista-ta]

Thanks, malkav, I think you said it extremely well, esp for not being able to say it in your mother tongue I like your perspective--and your view of "normal"

PS "Prejudice" might possibly be along the lines of what you're looking for ...

 

[Yimi]

I wish I was Beautiful...

Oh! John I dreamt of u Last nigh
and nowFinally I Have seen all the pics I could find on the web
This show is great, colorful, happy, good vibra...
I dont wanna talk about what does it mean,
because John always was so
wonderful clothes, strange references, crazy images...
Jonh has built the best fashion images in our epoque
what a luck to live it

I just wanna see and enjoy...
See, smile, and let me in...
Dream all this colors and clap my hands

I wait they dont make us wait a lot for the Videos
I am Waiting his last men Show too


this is from www.elle.com

 

[tulip]

Love it!

 

[fab_fifties_fille]

It really makes me think of the moulin rouge, la goulue (the glutton) along with the 'toulouse-esque' people, I'm not sure what the correct term for them is...midget, dwarf? The older scary women, sleezey look, rather french and drawn. I agree he uses them as props, but that is so much more 'galliano' is it not?