Pushing the envelope - avant garde style

[GasolineRainbow]

Why am I like what? I've obviously upset you, but I am also upset that this new definition doesn't warrant a new thread, in my opinion. I already said I'll just post on the previous thread when it doesn't fit, and here when it does. As for Greenberg, this thread was created to be about true avant-garde fashion, and I specifically used Greenberg to explain that many prominent theorists don't believe in avant-garde fashion in the first place. Even though his work is contested (as is normal with all discourse), it is very influential.

 

[softgrey]

Why am I like what? I've obviously upset you, but I am also upset that this new definition doesn't warrant a new thread, in my opinion. I already said I'll just post on the previous thread when it doesn't fit, and here when it does. As for Greenberg, this thread was created to be about true avant-garde fashion, and I specifically used Greenberg to explain that many prominent theorists don't believe in avant-garde fashion in the first place. Even though his work is contested (as is normal with all discourse), it is very influential.

i think that is actually a really valid and fascinating point..
i think that true purists could successfully make the argument that avant garde fashion doesn't exist...for all the reasons you so elegantly pointed out...
it's a valid argument...

but for the sake of this thread..
let's just concede that avant garde fashion does exist...
and that even beyond that...avant garde personal style does exist...
what is it?...
what does it look like?...

berlinrocks...after i typed that about Dior i wanted to take it back...
i think you're right...it's not avant garde...
but you are SO right that chanel is..
how could i have forgotten...?

you know who i think was avant garde...
Katherine Hepburn...

**were 1920's flappers avant garde because they took off their girdles..
and every single woman in the world followed suit...
???

 

[BerlinRocks]

^in terms of fashion and women history, imo they were ...

they pushed women to have their own opinions and express themselves ... I guess, in their art and way of dressing, they have changed minds. so yeah - according to Saint-Simon, who used for the 1st time in 1825 the word avant-garde out of the military context - they have some sort of avant-garde attitude. they made a huge impact.

on another note, for anyone interested by reading Clement Greenberg's essay Avant-Garde and Kitsch (1939) you can read it here :
http://www.sharecom.ca/greenberg/kitsch.html

This is Greenberg's breakthrough essay from 1939, written for the Partisan Review when he was twenty-nine years of age and at the time more involved with literature than with painting. He came, later, to reject much of the essay -- notably the definition of kitsch which he later believed to be ill thought out (as, indeed, it is.) Later he came to identify the threat to high art as coming from middlebrow taste, which in any event aligns much more closely with the academic than kitsch ever did or could. The essay has an air and assurance of '30s Marxism, with peculiar assumptions such as that only under socialism could the taste of the masses be raised. But for all that, the essay stakes out new territory. Although the avant-garde was an accepted fact in the '30s. Greenberg was the first to define its social and historical context and cultural import. The essay also carried within it the seeds of his notion of modernism. Despite its faults and sometimes heady prose, it stands as one of the important theoretical documents of 20th century culture.
-- TF

His essay Avant-Garde Attitudes can be found here :
http://www.sharecom.ca/greenberg/avantgarde.html

This essay from 1968 is a pendant to and correcttion of Greenberg's celebrated Avant Garde and Kitch of 1939. Here he expounds what came to be regarded as a defense or justification of his beleaguered position. In fact, his sense of the unique character of art is far from new or defensive; it goes back to his early years (as the recently-published Harold Letters attest. As the title suggests, to Greenberg avantgardism is an attitude, certainly not a style, and was important insofar as it was one of the driving forces behind modernism. But he senses its dissolution, as well, with its implications for high culture -- if everyone is out front, who lags behind? if there's no high, is everything middle?
Although this essay was delivered as a public lecture at a university, it points to Greenberg's separation from the academic world, which had become infested after the '60s with avant garde attitudes, as indeed, had popular culture. The question remains -- though no doubt a pointless one: are present-day academic and popular attitudes really avant, or is their avantness merely assumed?

 

[BerlinRocks]

and here is Saint-Simon quote - in french :

« C’est nous, artistes, qui vous servirons d’avant-garde : la puissance des arts est en effet la plus immédiate et la plus rapide. Nous avons des armes de toute espèce : quand nous voulons répandre des idées neuves parmi les hommes, nous les inscrivons sur le marbre ou sur la toile… Quelle plus belle destinée pour les arts, que d’exercer sur la société une puissance positive, un véritable sacerdoce et de s’élancer en avant de toutes les facultés intellectuelles, à l’époque de leur plus grand développement ! »

its babelfish translation :

“It is us, artists, who will be used to you as avant-garde: the power of arts is indeed most immediate and fastest. We have arm with any species: when we want to spread new ideas among the men, we register them on the marble or the fabric… What a more beautiful destiny for arts, than to exert on the company a positive power, a true priesthood and to spring in front of all intellectual faculties, at the time of their greater development! ”

 

[BerlinRocks]

and a quote of art critic Laverdant (1845) :

« L’Art, expression de la Société, exprime, dans son essor le plus élevé, les tendances sociales les plus avancées ; il est le précurseur et le révélateur. Or, pour savoir si l’art remplit dignement son rôle d’initiateur, si l’artiste est bien à avant-garde, il est nécessaire de savoir où va l’Humanité, quelle est la destinée de l’Espèce. »

babelfish translation :

Art, expression of the Society, express, in its highest rise, the social tendencies most advanced; it is the precursor and the revealing one. However, to know if art fulfills with dignity its role of initiator, if the artist with avant-garde, it is well necessary to know where Humanity goes, what is the destiny of the Species.

 

[pucci_mama]

Which leads this question now that everything has become so easily acessible can there still be a style that is described as avant garde?

 

[luckyme]

yes, because avant garde isnt necessarily about accessibility but the product that is derived from the artist's conception.

i firmly believe avant garde style does exist and its not about a single identifiable garment all the time, but, just as a designer can be innovative and edgy so can the wearer, by how and what they put together as an outfit. having a voice and stepping out of the herd to experiment with clothes is as natural to some as staying within the confines of acceptable society is to the larger population. a society needs those that see past "as is" to grow and stay interesting. wouldnt we just shrivel up with them?

the term can be as broad and as narrow as the creator takes it.

 

[gius]

can i call myself avant-garde because i wore cardigans way before everyone does it in the 2000s decade ?

can i call myself because i used to wear clutch and women bags before it became a huge trend for menswear ?

the part about grandparents and fathers already wearing cardigans...
i was thinking if it might be different,
if what you meant was that you wore cardigans when your own generation didn't.

italian men and their clutches in the 80s.
if it happens now, it might be out of place

and the same with men in skirts.

 

[pucci_mama]

yes, because avant garde isnt necessarily about accessibility but the product that is derived from the artist's conception.

i firmly believe avant garde style does exist and its not about a single identifiable garment all the time, but, just as a designer can be innovative and edgy so can the wearer, by how and what they put together as an outfit. having a voice and stepping out of the herd to experiment with clothes is as natural to some as staying within the confines of acceptable society is to the larger population. a society needs those that see past "as is" to grow and stay interesting. wouldnt we just shrivel up with them?

the term can be as broad and as narrow as the creator takes it.

I always thought it was a very specific term, but now it sems to be quite broad.

 

[BerlinRocks]

if what you meant was that you wore cardigans when your own generation didn't.

totaly ...
and i remember a friend who said 'oh look like a grandpa with your cardigan' ... and 2 seasons later this friend was wearing a cardigan because it hits some fabulous trendy shop ...

anyway ...

i wanted to post some "wearer" photos of avant-garde so i went onto SZ ... and sincerely found nothing very "pushing the envelope" ... i must say it's hard to find 'avant-garde' look outside the world of my sweet Rizzo ...
some of the SZ-ers are looking great and wearing some fabulous items but only a very few of them really push the bundaries (bcause they wear skirts over pants - a CDG total look almost) ...


we need pictures ...
+++ can we post pictures of SZ ?

 

[pucci_mama]

So it applies when you wear something most people around you don't wear at the moment?

Like I concider patent shoes quite classic but I remember about 5 years ago when it would still shock some people and I would get comments like where have you bought those a sex shop..?
Just because people were not really wearing them, does not mean they are avant garde? And now they are as common as normal leather! But surely that is just a cycle of fashion? Are these related?

 

[softgrey]

it is related...yes...

depending on HOW you wear them..
remember...
it's about the context...

women wearing trousers is not a big deal in this moment...
but in the 20's/30's it was unheard of...almost scandalous...
VERY avant garde..

so, yes...
classic items can take on an avant garde vibe if they are worn in a new or unexpected way...

i think that a lot of people who wear avant garde designer clothing items tend to combine them with very classic pieces actually...
otherwise it can be 'too much'...
and it is no longer tasteful or elegant...
it just becomes a silly costume...

which you might be able to get away with if you are bjork or some other stage performer...
but for real life...
one does have to consider practical matters...

ie- a margiela top with no armholes, while interesting as a concept, is a bit difficult to cook dinner in...
...

 

[Milada]

if what you meant was that you wore cardigans when your own generation didn't.

Ahaha. this reminds me of when I was younger and my brother looked at the laundry and said, ¨Ew, Dad, how can you wear tighty-whitey underwear?¨ And his reply was that his dad´s generation wore boxers, so they thought that was weird, so his generation wore the tighter, smaller, more fitted underwear underwear (I don´t know the proper term, sorry. I think it´s different from briefs). Not like I'd consider my boyfriend avant-garde if he wore them, but I´m just feeling nostalgic.

So what about dressier boots on men, hats, dress coats? All would could considered avant garde at my home school because it´s so far from the norm. Yet I´ll just refrain from using the term, because it´s waaaay too context-sensitive.

 

[softgrey]

totaly ...
and i remember a friend who said 'oh look like a grandpa with your cardigan' ... and 2 seasons later this friend was wearing a cardigan because it hits some fabulous trendy shop ...

anyway ...

i wanted to post some "wearer" photos of avant-garde so i went onto SZ ... and sincerely found nothing very "pushing the envelope" ... i must say it's hard to find 'avant-garde' look outside the world of my sweet Rizzo ...
some of the SZ-ers are looking great and wearing some fabulous items but only a very few of them really push the bundaries (bcause they wear skirts over pants - a CDG total look almost) ...


we need pictures ...
+++ can we post pictures of SZ ?

why not?
they take pictures from here ...and even thread ideas...
heck that whole forum was born from tFS...
they wouldn't exist if it wasn't for tFS...



i tried to find pics too...
but it really isn't easy...
like i said before...
i think a lot of the people who do this do it in a subtle way...
and also..i don't think they necessarily like the camera or want the attention...

...

 

[pucci_mama]

Thanks Soft.


I simply adore when someone takes something super classical and adds something avant garde into the mix. Classic with an edge. Sigh.

 

[chanelnumber5]

I would love to see some images of avant garde style in practice. Are there any public figures who are generally seen to be avant garde?

Also, I love how softgrey (I think) defined avant garde as being all in perspective with in historical context. Can this 'context' be extended to location, so - for example - whilst one outfit may not be avant garde in a big, cosmopolitan city such as NY or London, in a small village in the middle of rural England it would be avant garde.

I love this thread, thank you to everyone who has contribute with such insight

 

[BerlinRocks]

pictures of styling work from the late 80s and 00s
I do consider avant-garde ...
stylists include Ray Petri, Stephan Linard, Olivier Rizzo

niwde.blogspot.com / vogue.co.jp / hfgl

 

[softgrey]

I would love to see some images of avant garde style in practice. Are there any public figures who are generally seen to be avant garde?

Also, I love how softgrey (I think) defined avant garde as being all in perspective with in historical context. Can this 'context' be extended to location, so - for example - whilst one outfit may not be avant garde in a big, cosmopolitan city such as NY or London, in a small village in the middle of rural England it would be avant garde.

I love this thread, thank you to everyone who has contribute with such insight

glad you are enjoying the thread...


regarding location as context...
i think your question is valid and i have been thinking about this myself...
but i have to say..
in this world that we live in, where there are streetstyle and trendspotting pics all over the internet and the newstands...
i think that location isn't really a factor the way it might have been at some points in history...
i think that fashion and trends have really become global now...

this is definitely true for most major cities anyway...
of course, it's different in the suburbs and in rural areas..
so, i guess you could be considered fashion forward in smaller towns even if you would simply be considered trendy (or on trend) in major cities...

but i think that true avant garde style goes even beyond fashion forward...
it's doing something that no one else is doing yet...anywhere...
it's pulling stuff out of the sky...or out of your imagination...or from the bottom of your soul...


i think it's very hard to explain why you do it...
sometimes you don't even know why...
it just FEELS right...

 

[softgrey]

oh- berlin!...
is that pic with the jkt inside out styled by stephan linard?
i don't even know his work...but that image is styled beautifully...
very cool...B)

i also love the first one ...
total culture clash..the hassidic costume mixed with cowboy boots and wings...
priceless...
ray petri was so supremely influential...


all very nice examples my dear...
thank you very much for posting them...
...

 

[wheneveriwakeup]

Avant garde is my favorite style of dress...
It has zero to do with who you're wearing or what niche it hails from...
It's all about how the wearer interrupts a thought, a feeling, an idea... a singular notion...
I love that...

This thread is fantastic guys... full of insight...

Whomever mentioned Bizzy over in the other thread is spot on. She, imho, is incredibly avant-garde. Her looks are very subtle and elegant, but there is always an underlying current of energy and the unexpected. Truly evocative...

Also older members like nr9dream and droogist come to mind, too... both always managed to meld the unexpected and elegant together quite beautifully...