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Do you like learning more about crafts and traditions from all over the world and you don't know Garland Magazine yet? Well, you should check it out now.
The name of the magazine is inspired by the Indo-Pacific floral offerings: conceived as a mark of respect, the garland welcomes guests, honours individuals, adorns homes and decorates temples.
Yet, in the case of the magazine, the garland motif is also a metaphor for reaching out and connect writers, crafts, traditions and stories.
Indeed, it doesn't matter where we live, we are all connected and form a wonderfully unfinished human tapestry and Garland provides a platform to discover these connections through a wide range of stories about craftspeople and hand-made objects created all over the world (Garland has so far travelled from Australia to Japan, South Korea, India and Mexico, just to mention a few countries...), always keeping firmly in mind the strong bond human beings have with nature and without forgetting how technologies are having an impact on our lives.
While Garland is published quarterly, the Loop provides stories between issues, the Orbit lists major events, exhibitions, talks and tours while the monthly Laurel focuses on intriguing and inspiring objects that prompt readers to think.
Most content is free, but if you're part of the Circle of subscribers and contributors (the deadline for the next issue is 1st May 2021 and you can submit your story idea here) you will be able to access special sections such as the Quarterly Essays, ebooks and the monthly newsletter. And, if you're looking for exclusive presents, head for the Garlandshop or book sections where you may find magazines, ebooks, but also pendants and quarterly issues with uniquely hand-decorated covers created by refugee artists who are part of Melbourne Artists for Asylum Seekers.
Garland also publishes podcast interviews and hosts live conversations and in April I was honoured to be part of one of these conversations and was interviewed by Kevin Murray, the indefatigable editor at Garland magazine and Irenebrination supporter (thank you, Kevin). You can listen to the podcast at this link.
Can't travel yet because of Coronavirus restrictions? Subscribe to Garland, get your passport to world cultures and learn to speak the lingua franca of crafts.
The latest brand to join the trend is Overpriced.™ Founded earlier this year by Impossible Brief’s James Zwadlo and Chris Levett with Leighton James (of electronic music production duo Adventure Club), Overpriced.™ focuses on high-end fashion and hopes to make a social commentary about the concept of value (the motto "Fuck Your Money" is emblazoned on the front of the hoodie in neon green graffiti font) in connection with art (a topic that seems to interest other contemporary art collectives at the moment, such as MSCHF).
After announcing the debut of its NFT-based collection, Overpriced.™ launched a hoodie with a (patent-pending) scannable V-code on the front of the garment. Thanks to the code, users can see the history and metadata of the item, wear the garment in virtual settings online, authenticate and show off their unique NFT through a pop-up image link on any smartphonee. If the design they have bought gets lost, stolen, damaged or sold, the V-codes will become invalidated and the user will receive a new hoodie, that, replacing the previous one, will become the authentic piece. The "First Edition" hoodie sold at an auction on Blockparty.co for $26,000 USD.
But there is more behind this project: Overpriced.™ conceives its NFT designs as ways to challenge fashion and luxury and play around with a series of concepts - wondering what's real, original, authentic and wearable art. Besides, the brand's NFTs are a way to look at the value placed in the digital token and not the physical garment.
Overpriced.™ boasts on its site of making "fashion for the crypto generation", a statement that should make the fashion industry worry.
Coronavirus changed the fashion industry, prompting many designers to opt for digital events and shows, or videogaming collaborations, but Crypto Fashion poses new challenges to brands, houses and fashion groups that have showed in the last few months signs of desperation and a persistent lack of original ideas.
Teaming up, collaborating, showing "safety in numbers" with collections made with artists or celebrities seem to be the strategies of many fashion houses and brands at the moment. A few examples? Earlier on this month, Tod's Group appointed Chiara Ferragni as a member of its board of directors, hoping the Italian entrepreneur and influencer with 23.3 million Instagram followers may help them reaching out to younger consumers and build solidarity and support projects for those in need (as if Tod's - that in the past launched several cultural and social projects including the restoration of the Colosseum in Rome and building a new manufacturing plant in Arquata del Tronto, hard hit by an earthquake in August 2016 - had suddenly run out of ideas and projects to sponsor...).
Gucci has showed some interest in the possibilities offered by digital wardrobes and recently released its own AR sneaker. To celebrate its centenary, the fashion house launched yesterday its latest collection - entitled "Aria" - in collaboration with Balenciaga's Demna Gvasalia. The result was a Guccified version of Gvasalia's extremely wide shouldered coats or infamous legging-boots.
Alessandro Michele at Gucci mentioned the fact that the collection was created to make it look hacked by Balenciaga, the final result is indeed a hybrid, a combination of two brands.
Yet the Crypto Fashion generation seems to have already got their own hybrids: living between a physical and a digital world, suspended in that in-between phygital state, Crypto Fashion fans may force traditional fashion brands to readapt and generate a new concept of luxury that incorporates also NFTs (in much the same way Overpriced.™ has adapted some of the techniques of the fashion industry for its products - the brand borrowed the drop system, for example, from streetwear icons à la Supreme and warned fans to follow its Twitter page to keep updated about their next releases). So, it looks like the rush for the next fashion NFT has just started and you can bet that it's only a matter of days before a powerful fashion house such as Gucci or Prada auctions off its first NFT.
Released slightly over a year ago (on 20th March 2020), the Nintendo Switch title "Animal Crossing: New Horizons" proved extremely timely. Arriving in a pandemic while millions of people all over the world were in a lockdown, it became a success with players of all ages.
Many adults who had never played videogames before or who were skeptical about gaming, turned to the title to create their own virtual space, relax, meet old friends or find new ways to virtually socialise and travel while living in a perennially socially distanced world.
Yet, while most of us were socialising, buying digital clothes and decorating our mansions on our virtual islands, independent designers, big fashion houses and brands started seeing the potential of the videogame.
H&M is the latest one to join the "Animal Crossing" trend and for the occasion it has teamed up with HBO's Game of Thrones star Maisie Williams.
A keen supporter of eco-friendly designs, Williams has a conscious approach to life and she is very careful when it comes to consuming and loves recycling. Besides, she doesn’t support causes that she doesn’t feel passionate about.
Intrigued by H&M's desire to establish a more circular fashion loop and by their pledge to ensure 100 percent of their fabrics are sustainably sourced or recycled textiles by 2030, Williams accepted to become their global sustainability ambassador.
Throughout the year the actor will collaborate with H&M on a new initiative that started with the launch of a platinum-haired digital avatar of Williams that will appear at multiple VR events during 2021.
The avatar - created by the 3D animators at Goodbye Kansas Studio (well-known for designing the Keanu Reeves avatar in the "Cyberpunk 2077" game and for contributing with VFX to Wes Anderson's upcoming film "The French Dispatch") - has made its appearance this week on Nintendo's Animal Crossing.
Adapted into an Animal Crossing character, Williams' avatar will welcome visitors on H&M's Looop Island (available until 20th April).
You should be able to visit Looop Island by requesting a Dodo Code at the official @Looop Twitter account, but if you DM them they may say there are too many requests and just give you the Dream Address (DA-3314-6895-7902) to visit the island at your leisure (please remember that to visit islands or to access dreams you will need a Nintendo Switch Online membership).
Apart from being a marketing tool (check out the various H&M flags and signs scattered around the island), Looop Island has an eco-friendly purpose: once you arrive, you can get from the terminal on the left of your bed (if you've arrived from your dream state like I did with my avatar as showed in the images in this post) two designs - a white dress or a T-shirt, both accessorised with a purple scarf (purple is the theme colour of the island) inspired by the ensemble donned by Maisie's avatar.
The items are free and they will then appear in your Pro-design app on your smartphone and you will be able to use them also once you’re back on your island from your dream.
You can now start your journey through the island, but first pick up from the ground some items that were left for you, such as a red balloon (meant to match the colour of the H&M logo, but ending up looking like the sort of accessory Pennywise out of Stephen King's It may like...), a striped swimsuit, a pinwheel and ten cupcakes, then follow the sign and, next to the Able Sisters shop (which is shut), you will discover a Looop Machine, the game's first recycling station.
The name "Looop" is inspired by the retailer's real-life recycling machine that was launched in October with the goal of closing "the loop in fashion" by finding a purpose for unused garments.
If you’re allowed a proper visit to the island, you will be able to leave digital unwanted garments, purchased or made on your island or gifted to you by other inhabitants or friends in "Animal Crossing", on a bench next to the machine. In this way you can recycle unwanted game outfits, re-enacting H&M's in-store garment-to-garment recycling system (that was actually suspended in most countries during the Coronavirus pandemic).
Before moving away from this space check out the Super Mario pipe hidden behind the tree in front of the Able Sisters shop: it will take you directly to an abstract secret space bathed in a purple light that recreates the purple space seen in H&M's advert featuring Maisie Williams.
Then there are other activities you can do on the island: you can walk around the paths, admire the orchards, sit in meticulously furnished open air restaurants and cafes or visit some of the locals (some of them may not be too friendly and will ask you what are you doing there...).
As you walk around you may bump into the avatar of H&M's Global Sustainability Manager, Pascal Brun, whose single catchphrase is just "Looop it!"
Inside the Looop Mansion you will discover a spacious office with posters and adverts on the walls inspired by real H&M ads; the fashion innovation lab with rolls of fabrics on the walls (we would have much preferred to get those designs for free from the terminal rather than Maisie Williams' outfits…), Maisie Williams' apartment upstairs (with some items recreated from her own house and from the items she has on her island in Animal Crossing) and a basement with a runway complete with backstage, lights, a video camera and a small selection of garments part of H&M's next recycled collection.
After doing your little runway show, walk around the glowing forest with its purple hyacinth fields, star-shaped lilac lamps and a romantic full moon.
Once you've finished exploring the island wear your swimsuit, jump in the water and swim till you get to a secluded beach where you will find Williams' avatar outside her tent.
Like Pascal, she has just one catchphrase ("Let's change fashion!"), but on 13th April Williams and Pascal had a debate about recycling and circular fashion and maybe the characters' catchphrases may have been expanded to incorporate more messages about preserving our planet and reinventing the industry.
Before leaving, check out the messages on the board outside the town's village services: if you're on a proper visit you may be able to leave your own message, but if you've landed on Looop Island in your dream, you will only be able to read Pascal's notes (featuring bizarre repetitions, typos and grammar mistakes: "Join the recycling revolution! Drop your unwanted piece of piece of clothing by the Looop machine and pick up our exclusive H&M outfit from Able sisters", "Help us work towards a better fashion future. Together we can close the loop", "Let's change fashion - our goal is for all H&M materials to be recycled or sourced more sustainable by 2030").
Animal Crossing-wise the island is tremendously well designed and detailed: you will love every corner of it, from its hyacinths to its emphasis on green energies, with vast rows of solar panels and wind turbines installed in prominent positions.
That said it has its questionable moments (apart from Pascal's messed up messages...): the museum is more or less a "Day of the Triffids" situation, for example. So, while outside the island is pulsating with orchards and gardens, inside the museum there are no creatures in the displays, one dinosaur is left unfinished and there is no art section, as if Nintendo had grown tired of designing this part for H&M or as if H&M had thought that creating the main areas for the island was enough.
Then there is the entire point of actually "recycling" your in-game clothes: the main point about Looop Island is encouraging visitors to learn about the importance of recycling while playing.
So you may arrive on the island for a visit via Dodo Airlines and drop a pair of digital trousers (you can't drop anything if you arrive on the island from your dreams - and that's bad as most users are offered this option - and if you can't actually do any recycling the whole purpose of the island is undermined), and maybe the next day you may want to recycle a pair of trousers in real life.
If there wouldn't be this educational purpose behind the island, there wouldn't be any need for it to exist. That said, most players use their bells (the island's currency) to buy an assortment of things, including items and clothes they may not necessarily need or that they know they may not be wearing for a long time.
When they are tired of these objects, they sell them in the local shop, give them to another islander or to a friend, in a nutshell, players already recycle their unwanted clothes, so they don't desperately need a recycling point on any island to get rid of them.
So, while as a whole the island is a pleasant experience and the collaboration reconfirms the huge success of "Animal Crossing: New Horizons" (that, according to the latest figures, has so far sold 31.18 million units), Looop Island has its questionable sides.
Critics may see this as another attempt by H&M to greenwash their act, after all the company that has started producing collections featuring items made with a plant-based leather alternative made from cactus plants and yarn made from castor oils, remains one of fashion's biggest polluters and just a few years ago was accused of burning leftover stock.
Some doubts remain about all these collaborations with Animal Crossing: last year Nintendo issued guidelines to those companies that had started using "Animal Crossing: New Horizons" to promote their businesses. Among the other guidelines, the company stated, "Please do not leverage the Game as a marketing platform that directs people to activities or campaigns outside the game (including directing people to a sales page, distributing coupons, sweepstakes, giveaways, requiring consumers to follow social network services accounts, gathering customers' information, or other invitational activities).
You are not allowed to obtain any financial benefit from using the Game (including selling your Custom Design or earning any advertising revenue with the Game content)."
In a way these points seem to be violated by these collaborations with famous brands that essentially use the game as a marketing platform and hope to obtain financial benefits (H&M customers who collect Conscious points by buying the brand's products will get the chance to win a purple bandana neck scarf like the one Maisie's avatar wears in the game, made from 100% recycled materials, so you may argue they are encouraging to buy their products).
One last doubt also remains: what will we actually learn from recycling digital clothes? As soon as England came out of lockdown, queues of people started forming in front of clothes shops and fast fashion retailers, as if we all needed an immediate fashion fix and the lessons learnt in lockdown (i.e. we don't need as many clothes we buy) were already forgotten.
As for the Able Sisters, will they succumb to fast fashion? Well, let's hope not, we have indeed grown fond of the hard-working fashionable porcupines spreading the ideals of slow fashion on our islands.
Yet costumes are obviously also inspired by fashion and this is the case for the designs seen in some of the films that yesterday evening won three different categories at the 23rd annual Costume Designers Guild Awards (the awards were handed out with a virtual ceremony on Twitter).
Legendary Oscar and Tony-winner Ann Roth won the category Excellence in Period Film with the costumes for George C. Wolfe's "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom" (Roth also won best costumes for this film at last Sunday's BAFTA Awards).
A journey through the recording sessions of the "Mother of the Blues", real-life singer Ma Rainey (Oscar-winner Viola Davis) and her band members (the late Chadwick Boseman stars in the role of cornet player Levee), the story takes place in Chicago in the late '20s.
Visually speaking the film is full of inspiring textures with sets that betray the influence of photographer Richard Samuel Roberts and the woodcuts of painters Jacob Lawrence and Aaron Douglas. The sets make the luscious jewel toned costumes donned by Ma Rainey and her girlfriend Dussie Mae (Taylour Paige) genuinely shine.
Roth created for Ma Rainey a bold and lavish showbiz wardrobe with red or blue gowns often embelished with sequins or long fringes that move as the singer performs. Even in summer, Ma Rainey wears a mink fur stole that gives her status and puts her under the spotlight, turning heads in Chicago.
Excellence in Contemporary Film went to "Promising Young Woman", written and directed by Emerald Fennell, with costumes by Nancy Steiner (who, in her acceptance speech, took the opportunity to ask the industry to pay costume designers what they are worth, "So much of what you see onscreen is our work," she stated. "It influences culture, fashion and results in additional profits for the studio (...) it's time for pay equity now").
But these innocent, romantic and at times childish pastel tones hide a very dark character: Cassie (Carey Mulligan) is indeed seeking revenge for the death of her best friend Nina, a rape victim.
Cassie is on a mission to punish men and, while she dresses to appeal her targets at night with bodycon designs, high heels and undone buttons, her daily uniform is almost angelic, with pink fluffy sweaters and shirts with prints of delicate flowers.
This wardrobe that you can easily find in stores or online is actually a coverup, a pastel world that hides a thirst for revenge and that serves the character to camouflage herself.
At the same time the clothes she wears reveal that Cassie is not a silly girl, but a cleverly brilliant mind who knows how to use clothes at their best - after all who would ever suspect a young blonde smiling woman with a deer baseball top and pastel manicure?
The episode features indeed Dolores who, with a swift gesture of her hand, changes her look, radically transforming a black short dress into a floor-length gold gown. So there's two dresses in one, with the gold dress rolled up inside the black dress and held together with snaps.
As you may remember from a previous post, Chalayan's designs could be transformed with just one gesture and in that case the trick was possible by simply tugging a flap around the neckline.
The draped fabric folded around the neck area would then release forming an over-layer and an entirely new look. In that case dresses changed their colours from black to beige or dark burgundy to black, but also the surfaces changed with a short dress in a peeling black fabric with multi-coloured nuances that turned into a floor-length gown in a smooth soft fabric.
The effect achieved in "Westworld" was exactly the same, so maybe in this case the costume designer should have maybe given credit to Chalayan.
When we think about ballet our minds immediately conjure up ethereal visions of dancers performing en pointe work. Yet history tells us that pointe work wasn't derived from the poetic visions of a choreographer, but from a sort of acrobatic and sensational style.
There are records of dancers who performed on their toes as early as the 1720s, but the practice developed in the early 19th century when Italian dancers added spectacular tricks to their shows: in one of them, devised probably by Amalia Brugnoli, performers danced on their toes.
Choreographer Filippo Taglioni and his daughter Marie perfected the style, refining poses and postures. Working for 6 hours a day every day for 6 months, Marie developed great physical power, while retaining her femininity and grace.
Marie reinvented Brugnoli's en pointe move: practicing for long hours to make sure that she didn't look as if she was suffering and she didn’t grimace as she rose to her toes, Marie created a new style.
Taglioni actually danced in a sort of half pointe position as her shoes weren't hard or boxed as today's shoes, but soft with a rounded toe in satin and with ribbons attached to the arch that laced up around the ankle.
They were tapered at the tip and tiny as small shoes allowed dancers to stiff the metatarsal and make it easier to stand on toes (and to hurt their feet as well by dislocating bones...). Taglioni entered the history of ballet by dancing in 1832 in the romantic piece La Sylphide, choreographed by her father and created to highlight her pointe work.
There's currently a digital exhibition at the Toronto-based Bata Shoe Museum (still closed due to Coronavirus), that invites virtual visitors to look at some of the shoes in the museum collection and discover a little bit about the history of pointe shoes via brief explanatory screens.
"On Pointe: The Rise of The Ballet Shoes" opens with the origins of the ballet footwear that was first inspired by fashionable shoes from the 1800s. Ballet shoes looked indeed like the footwear of the time, but when high heels went out of fashion and thin satin flats became the norm in the 19th century, dancers adapted and opted for flat-soled slippers. These shoes were made as straights so there was no distinction between left or right and that eventually became the norm also for ballet shoes.
Rising on the toes became easier with the advent of the pointe shoe: hard-blocked shoes appeared with Anna Pavlova and Carlotta Brianza. Pavlova added to her shoes a leather sole inside the pointe to widen it and make it more solid. In the Unites States she approached Salvatore Capezio who made a custom pair of shoes for her. Her design eventually turned into the standard and, though it wasn't favoured at the beginning as some critics thought that adding a wider leather sole in the pointe was like cheating, it was finally accepted.
The exhibition at Bata Shoe Museum is a short one that makes some very good points that you may want to take into consideration and maybe explore more in future. First of all ballet slippers are the result of artisanal work: they are indeed hand-made (if you're studying shoe design or would like to become a shoemaker, consider also this career) and could be considered as couture products as the shoes destined to performers working for companies are usually made to the specifications of the dancers.The The shoes are made following the highest standards as the toe box and shank must allow the dancer's weight to be transferred to the platform. Dancers go through several pairs of shoes during training, rehearsals and performances: the Bata Shoe Museum has for example got in its archive three pair of worn out ballet shoes that belonged to Veronica Tennant, one of Canada's most famous ballerinas. Tennant needed a different pair of shoes for each act of the performance Onegin (1985).
The exhibition makes another important point, regarding the colour of the shoes: as the foot is considered an extension of the leg, a dancer's slippers usually have to match their skin tone to create a seamless line from leg to toe.
But, historically, 'nude' ballet slippers have been either pink or peach (and we wrongly identify nude with a pale pink tone, while nude should just be something that blends with one's skin and not to two or three shades of pink and maybe beige), even while professional dance companies began to diversify, which meant that dancers with darker skin tones had to dye their shoes or cover them with cosmetics. The limited colour offering meant that dancers with different skin tones had to spend more time than their colleagues dyeing their slippers.
In more recent years there have been companies who have worked on providing shoes for darker skin tones: in 2017, Bloch began to produce their "Cocoa" shade ballet slipper and, a year later, the dance company Ballet Black, which celebrates Black and Asian representation in ballet, collaborated with Freed London to release shade-inclusive ballet slippers. By highlighting this point, the Museum raises questions about diversity and inclusion in ballet.
Ballet and pointe shoes have constantly inspired special exhibition and fashion collections, so discovering a bit more about the story of the iconic slippers and their evolution through a brief exhibition with videos, images of dance icons and shoes may prompt digital visitors to research this topic further, providing them with intriguing inspirations for collections, collaborations and other creative projects.
Cryptocurrencies have revolutionised the way of making and trading money, generating new ventures and businesses, but traditional currencies have definitely inspired quite a few artists throughout the decades.
Artist Stacey Lee Webber is another clever currency converter: she employs indeed American dollar banknotes and coins to make art and interior design pieces, but also statement jewelry.
Webber uses banknotes as canvases or textiles: some of her banknotes incorporate hand-embroidered geometrical patterns and motifs that erase or hide the original images with elaborate stitches that destroy the main function of the banknote.
But she also uses her embroidered motifs to play with the very serious look of the portraits on the bills, radically transforming them: these unsmiling figures - from Abraham Lincoln to Alexander Hamilton, from Gandhi to Galileo Galilei and Nikola Tesla - are transformed from very serious figures into colourful clowns, rebellious punks and Frankenstein-like monsters, while Chairman Mao is turned into an Andy Warhol-like character complete with white wig and Albert Einstein gets a makeover in Carmen Miranda style with signature fruit hat.
But, while these pieces are inspired by Webber's imagination, others move from current events: the 2021 US Capitol building siege in Washington DC inspired her banknotes with the building enveloped in flames and with the White House partially obscured by an unfinished brick wall.
The themes explored in these banknotes are reimagined also in her Uncut Sheets series: hinting at anger and turmoil, the uncut sheets of money are employed as larger canvases incorporating abstract geometrical motifs at times reminiscent of graffiti.
Playing with hard (the banknote paper) and soft (the threads) materials, Webber uses traditional stitches to redesign the banknotes, covering their muted colours with bright threads and subverting in this way the purpose and value of the currency.
The banknotes lose their purpose and value to re-acquire a completely new aim and objective: from a medium of exchange for goods and services, the banknotes become works of art that capture our attention, make us laugh or prompt us to ponder about contemporary political, financial and social issues.
Webber trained as metalsmith, though, rather than an embroiderer and in her studio located in an old industrial building in Philadelphia (you can check out her Instagram page to get an insight about her work in this space), she produces different pieces soldering coins together to create larger artworks or carving the central motifs of coins and covering them in colourful vitreous enamel, a material made by fusing powdered glass to a substrate by firing in a kiln.
Webber employs this technique to create wall pieces or jewelry characterised by a smooth, durable, vitreous and bright coloured coating.
Quite often the artist and designer employs the elements she carves out of the coins to create her pieces for her own collections or for collaborative projects: for Oscar de la Renta's S/S 19 collection she made a wide-range of necklaces, earrings and rings with antiqued vermeil coins that at times evoked ancient Roman and Greek jewelry.
But there is more behind Webber's practice (check out her shop to get a quick idea of her current/latest pieces) as a currency converter: throughout the years she has used American and international coins to create delicate landscape scenes inside circular frames and has turned copper and silver coins (the latter were often given to her by the clients who commissioned her the pieces) into unique objects such as vessels, tools that question the value of labor and time inherent in the object, sculptural pieces, or objects contained within the home of a nine to five laborer (the artist celebrated the American working class also through a series of flowers made with oxidized brass screws).
Exchange rates are derived from state economic policies, international negotiated regimes, agent activity in the foreign exchange market and macroeconomic fundamentals but, through her pieces, Webber establishes new exchange rates based on personal art variables (the techniques she employs). In this way money loses its purchasing power while banknotes and coins turn into unique works of art and accessories.
Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) have been around for a few years now, but a trend has literally exploded in the last few months, maybe pushed also by the pandemic that confined us in our houses and in digital spaces, culminating in March in Christie's sale of Beeple's monumental digital collage for a record sum, $69,346,250. Confident NFTs will reshape the art landscape, Sotheby's launched an auction of digital art - The Fungible Collection by Pak.
The anonymous creator. who has been producing digital art for over two decades, is also the founder and lead designer of the studio Undream and creator of Archillect, an AI built to discover and share stimulating visual media. The auction - that will go live from tomorrow to 14th April - is released in collaboration with Nifty Gateway, a marketplace specializing in the sale and auction of non-fungible tokens.
Every asset for sale in The Fungible Collection is a non-fungible token (NFT). It is worthwhile remembering here for those readers who didn't follow our previous posts that a non-fungible token is a distinct, indivisible, scarce and verifiable token on a blockchain network (but the ownership of a non-fungible token can still be transferred from one address on the network to another).
The Fungible Open Editions will enable collectors to purchase as many fungible cubes as they wish during the sale period for a fixed price ($500 per unit). These fungible cubes can be purchased individually (in batches of 1, 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 500 and 1,000) or many at a time (so when a Collector purchases 6 cubes, they will receive 2 "Five Cubes" NFTs and "A Cube" NFT; when they purchase 26 cubes, they will receive 3 NFTs with "Twenty Cubes", "Five Cubes" and "A Cube", summing up to 26 cubes in fungible value).
There is a game-like rewarding element in the auction aimed at exploring and understanding the concept of value in connection with art: the 100 collectors who purchase the most Open Edition cubes by the end of day 3, will receive Complexity, a collection of 100 NFTs; The Cube is instead a unique, "one-of-one" NFT that will be given to the individual who purchases the most Open Edition cubes by the end of day 3; Equilibrium is a "four-of-four" where each edition will be sent to the winners of a series of challenges, from solving Pak's puzzle to posting a dedicated hashtag (#PakWasHere) to the biggest social media audience or estimating the total sale of the entire collection prior to the auction beginning on April 12.
"The Builder" is instead a set of 30 NFTs that will be given to artists, builders, and creators (recipients will be determined by Pak) who have paved the way for Pak and other NFT artists.
Last but not least, "The Switch", developed to be used with a public call by it's owner, is a unique, "one of one" NFT that demonstrates the evolution of artwork in the digital realm.
Sotheby's Pak auction is therefore an experimental auction aimed at a younger generation of collectors (the starting bid for The Switch, but also for The Pixel, represented by a single and basic pixel unit, is $1) who may be interested in exploring the concept of value through CryptoArt.
The world of fashion is definitely not sitting back and watching: while there have been multiple experiments and collaborations with design studios and brands creating digital designs, we haven't seen yet a promiment fashion house or brand releasing a design as a non-fungible token (but how long will we have to wait? Probably just a few days...), yet things are quickly evolving.
Kate Moss has for example created three short videos with anonymous artist collective, Moments in Time. The videos show Moss engaging in everyday activities - sleeping, walking and driving. The three videos - "Drive With Kate," "Walk With Kate" and "Sleep With Kate" - will be auctioned off as NFTs through digital platform Foundation (auction opens on Tuesday starting at 9 a.m. EST for 24 hours) and part of the proceeds will benefit Adwoa Aboah's Gurls Talk charity (each video will be sold with a unique audio certification recorded by Moss acknowledging the buyer who will also be announced in a social post through the Kate Moss Agency).
In a statement accompanying the videos, Moss explains "Art for me has always been about the moment. Time is the thing that there is never enough of and that waits for no one. I'm intrigued by who will want to own a moment of mine. I was also drawn to the idea that this ownership can be used to help others in need hopefully gain more of it. I look forward to seeing this experiment through."
There's a difference between Sotheby's Pak NTFs and Moss's artworks: the former cater to passionate fans of digital art, abstract geometries and architectures; Moss's videos are actually more mundane rather than technological, aimed at offering short snippets of real life (they were recorded at Moss's own home and feature the model driving her own car and wearing her own clothes) while helping a charity.
So which one will you be opting for, Pak's abstract geometries or Kate Moss's mundane NTFs? Whichever you choose, remember, the term "NFT" is not just destined to become the word of the year: according to a report released earlier on this year by NonFungible.com, an NFT market analyst firm, the non-fungible token market tripled in 2020, with the total value of transactions increasing by 299%, so NFTs are definitely destined to become a leading emerging asset class for the Virtual Economy.
Peace was found on Thursday in a recent controversy from Hell between Nike and conceptual art collective MSCHF over the so-called "Satan Shoes", designed in collaboration with singer Lil Nas X.
Released at the end of March, the modified pair of Nike Air Max 97 featured a pentagram pendant and a reference to a verse from the Gospel of Luke ("I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven", 10:18), and contained 60cc of red ink, visible from the transparent section of the sole and "one drop of human blood".
Limited to 666 pairs retailing at $1,018, the sneakers sparked outrage when Lil Nas X announced their release, even though they were sold out as soon as they hit the web. Religious and conservative consumers, thinking this was an official collaboration with Nike, called for a boycott, and Nike, that never showed anything against MSCHF's previous "Jesus Shoes", distanced itself from the product and sued MSCHF for "trademark infringement and dilution, false designation of origin, and unfair competition".
At the beginning of April, US district judge Eric Komitee gave Nike a temporary restraining order preventing manufacturer MSCHF from shipping out the 666 pairs of shoes to customers.
Eventually Nike Inc. reached a settlement on Thursday and MSCHF accepted Nike's request to voluntarily recall to buy back not only the 665 sneakers sold (sneakers number 666th were supposed to be a giveaway, but they were scrapped after the judge's temporary order), but also any Jesus Shoes, for their original retail prices to remove them in this way from circulation.
"Purchasers who choose not to return their shoes and later encounter a product issue, defect, or health concern should contact MSCHF, not Nike .The parties are pleased to put this dispute behind them," Nike concluded in its official statement. Nothing was added about people who may own the shoes, who may be taking pictures of themselves wearing the sneakers and who may be posting the images on social media. For what regards the by now ultra-rare "Satan Shoes" you can currently find some pairs on eBay, with offers going from $3,000 to $20,000.
Now while this case from Hell has closed, the satanic footwear has opened many debates in the creative world: practices such as remixing, collaging, reclaiming and repurposing certain fashion items have always been around. Certain products or works of art wouldn't exist if designers and artists hadn't dismembered certain pieces and re-collaged them in a different configuration. In the last 20 years fashion designers have transformed from Takeji Hirakawa's "Fashion DJs" into professional "Fashion Remixers" and we all know that, quite often, a remix is better than the original version.
We have seen Martin Margiela repurposing a wide variety of materials throughout the decades, and Marine Serre's designs often include regenerated and recycled materials. Now in these cases the designers mainly employed fabrics, bedsheets, socks or towels that did not feature any specific trademarked logo, so they avoided enraging any specific company. MSCHF's shoes incorporated Nike's iconic Swoosh logo, but in a way it was probably the association with Satan that, more than anything else, scared Nike (otherwise they would have immediately sued MSCHF when the collective released the "Jesus Shoes").
There are two essential problems to consider now: we mentioned one in the previous post about the "Satan Shoes", as MSCHF accepted Nike's request, from now on other brands that may see their products being repurposed by artists and designers and may not like their interpretation, may simply sue them. Yet this is a double-edged sword: take the case of the hip hop tailor of Harlem, Dapper Dan, who used to create in the '80s DIY designs from fabrics covered in brand logos such as Gucci or Vuitton.
At the time the designer played a dangerously ironic game with luxury products and logos. Sued for his bootlegged pieces, after Alessandro Michele at Gucci "homaged" one of his jackets, Dapper Dan rose to fame again, becoming a Gucci icon and star collaborator, ending up proving that quite often bootlegs are more original and desirable than the original products and therefore more fun for consumers. This can be said for example about La Californienne's repurposed Rolex and Cartier watches with their colourful faces and bands that look infinitely more desirable than the usual models (Rolex was upset about the company and sued them - see Rolex Watch U.S.A., Inc. v. Reference Watch LLC d/b/a La Californienne; Rolex won this trademark infringing case, but you can still buy some of these repurposed models on Farfetch). You can indeed bet that, even though Rolex won, in few years' time both the luxury watch brands repurposed by La Californienne will start making more colourful watches.
The second point to consider is that too often when an anonymous designer or an artist uses a famous brand's logo in a controversial way, that specific brand immediately distances itself, launching a legal action against them. But when that powerful brand decides to do the same, they make their design pass for an experimental project or for a tribute or homage (this is often what happens when a fashion house copies a traditional garment).
An example? Nike recently did an unauthorised experimental version of its Air Force 1 sneakers inspired by the white, red and blue USPS cardboard boxes and with a patch reproducing the U.S. Postal Service's Priority Mail shipping label, but the shoes weren't the result of any special collaboration.
USPS issued indeed a statement at the beginning of April stating, "The Postal Service, which receives no tax dollars for operating expenses and relies on the sale of postage, products and services to fund its operations, protects its intellectual property. Officially licensed products sold in the marketplace expand the affinity for the Postal Service brand and provide incremental revenue through royalties that directly support it. Sales of unauthorized and unlicensed products deny support to the hardworking women and men of the Postal Service."
"This is an unfortunate situation where a large brand such as Nike, which aggressively protects its own intellectual property, has chosen to leverage another brand for its own gain. The Postal Service is disappointed in Nike's lack of response to repeated attempts to come to a solution. The Postal Service will take whatever actions it deems necessary to protect its valuable IP rights."
So it seems that when Nike borrows from other companies for its "experimental sneakers" it "pays homage" or "gets inspired"; when independent artists customise a pair of Nike shoes and resell them, they infringe Nike's copyright. In conclusion, what we learnt from the "Satan Shoes" case is that hypocrisy is rife in the fashion industry.
For what regards Nike, though, it's about time for them to change their strategy: some companies started side projects in which they give out products to get them repurposed. Nike could do the same: launching an incubator for dedicated artists' projects and special one-off designs that may give new life to old pieces and innovative perspectives on the brand.
There is a great interest in sneakers (auction houses constantly organise sneaker auctions to attract younger customers and collectors) so they could start with shoes. Such a venture would be beneficial as in this way they would avoid destroying unwanted stock, offering at the same time fun and unique designs to consumers. Nike and other prominent brands should indeed start realising that it's better to join rebellious and creative minds rather than suing them: they do have indeed bright ideas that generate consumer desire and involvement and that's exactly what these brands are looking for.
As seen in the previous post, a devilish woman can provide great inspirations in film and fashion as well and yesterday we looked at a woman who becomes a satanic femme fatale to win back her husband's affection. But there are devilish women also in the history of comics: in the violent and sexually explicit comic Satanik, for example, Marny Bannister, is a talented biologist with a tragic and traumatic past.
Mistreated by her family who considers her a sort of monster for a birthmark that disfigures a large part of her face, Marny takes revenge upon society after discovering a miraculous formula that transforms her into a beautiful woman – Satanik.
In the stories created by Max Bunker with drawings by Roberto Raviola, AKA Magnus Pictor (or simply Magnus) published between 1964 and 1974, Satanik was a relentless killing machine intent on unleashing her destructive power upon men and women and capable of committing unspeakable deeds that went from injecting acid into her own sister's veins to sexually exploiting her male victims.
In the comic, Satanik was usually clad in a witch-like red and black costume, and attracted, repulsed and frightened the readers for her thirst for money, men, power, sex and success.
On a par with the Devil, Satanik was conceived by its author as a sort of female Dr Jekyll and Mister Hyde, while the stories that saw her as main character often proved to be combinations of plots taken from Robert Louis Stevenson, Oscar Wilde, Howard Phillips Lovecraft and Edgar Allan Poe.
In Max Bunker's stories, supernatural elements (ghosts, vampires and mummies included...) were mixed with sex scenes and noir comics turned into erotic tales aimed at an entirely new audience and readership.
Satanik represented everything that society wanted to repress, in particular women's sexual power: its sadistic, avid and violent heroine destroyed all the last taboos that were still standing.
Legend goes that anonymous calls to Bunker often asked him to stop producing this comic because it was inconceivable that a woman could commit such criminal acts.
Male readers saw in this figure the embodiment of every man's erotic dream, but female readers, especially those ones who didn't see themselves as fitting the canons of beauty set by society, looked up at Satanik as a final liberation, a nemesis against men and society.
The comic book was turned in 1967 into a film: directed by Piero Vivarelli and released the following year, it was characterised by an almost inconsistent plot.
Polish model Magda Konopka starred as Marnie Bannister, a clever scientist and assistant to Professor Greaves (Nerio Bernardi), a famous biologist. Greaves thinks he may have discovered a potion that restores beauty and youth to whoever takes it and Marnie decides to try it on herself after killing her fellow colleague who is reluctant at making her risk her life for the sake of science.
Marnie takes the potion, gags and passes out, but, when she awakens, she realises the potion worked: she's been transformed and from disfigured, Marnie has turned into a gorgeous sensual young woman who seduces a rich man, George Van Donen (Umberto Raho).
But the police is soon after her, and, when she discovers that the effects of the potion do not last long, Marnie finds herself on the run and leaves behind her a trail of corpses.
In the film there is an emphasis on Marnie as the femme fatale: she's never actually called "Satanik", but the director portrays her more like a Dr Jekyll-Mr Hyde figure.
The costumes for this film were designed by Berenice Sparano and they were made by the tailoring house Tigano Lo Faro, founded by Serafina Tigano Lo Faro in Rome in the late '50s (its original name was Costumearte; the tailoring house first started working for the Rome Opera Theatre, but then developed collaborations with costume designers and tailors working for the stage and the big screen as well).
The film was shot at the end of the '60s and Marnie's wardrobe follows the trends of the time: one of the first dresses we see her wearing after her transformation is a mini-dress with a grid-like tulle motif and strategically placed patches of yolk yellow and orange sequins that cover her erogenous zones.
For a date with Van Donen, Marnie wears a sequined turquoise and white ensemble that looks like a one piece dress, but that actually consists in three parts - a bra, a skirt and a tall belt - and we discover this illusion when she sensually undresses (this trick that could be reused and reinvented in a modern collection to create a two-in-one design, so fashion designers out there, please take note).
When Marnie turns up at Stella's house (the girlfriend of a criminal who has betrayed him handing him to the police), she's wearing a hooded red and white striped top that perfectly embodies the concept of stripes being associated with evil and transgression (during the Middle Ages they were usually donned by court clowns, jugglers, prostitutes, hangmen, lepers and heretics, just to mention a few categories ostracised by the rest of society...).
During her trip to Switzerland Marnie wears a printed rusty orange mini-dress with a large tie accessorised with large glasses and a hat, but we also see her in a pastel shade bikini evoking Paco Rabanne's style. Towards the end of the film she instead appears in a Diabolik-meets-Irma Vep leotard, while performing a strip tease at Dodo La Roche's (Luigi Montini) club.
Most costumes in the film are used to show Konopka's body and the story is rather superficial compared to the comics.
Satanik was considered as an innovative anti-heroine as she took advantage of her sex appeal for her criminal activities, but here Marnie seems only interested in using her beauty to get the attention of men and steal their money.
The final idea of the film was showing how ugly Marnie didn't look acceptable by society, but she was a clever hard-working scientist, while beautiful bombshell Marnie, adored and desired by all men, is actually perversely wicked.
Visually there was an intent here of replicating the moods of films à la "Diabolik" by Mario Bava and maybe reference anti-heroines such as Eva Kant, interpreted on the big screen by Marisa Mell (Konopka does looks a bit like Marisa Mell when she wears a blonde wig).
Who knows, maybe there will be a modern remake at some point of this film that may reshift the attention on the original comic, what's for sure is that such a movie would provide an entirely new wardrobe for this devilish anti-heroine.
Yesterday's post focused on a "satanic" theme, so let's follow the evil thread from a glamorous perspective with an iconic black and white pre-Code Hollywood film, Cecil B. DeMille's "Madam Satan" (1930). A constant inspiration for many fashion designers thanks to its Art Deco moods and extravagant costumes by Gilbert Adrian, "Madam Satan" combines different film genres - fantasy, mystery and musical comedy - together.
The film is essentially a romantic comedy dealing with wealthy and conservative Angela (Kay Johnson) discovering her husband Bob's (Reginald Denny) affair with a woman called Trixie (Lillian Roth). Bob's adulterous behaviour drives the couple to split, but then Angela regrets the decision and tries to win her husband's affection back playing Trixie's seduction card.
Some of the strongest scenes of the film take place during a bizarre costume party organised by Bob's friend Jimmy on a Zeppelin CB-P-55, a wonderfully imaginative location, also thanks to sets by Cedric Gibbons – who was heavily influenced by Parisian Art Deco – and Mitchell Leisen.
The Zeppelin sequences were originally scheduled to be filmed in Technicolor, but the original plan was abandoned because Technicolor could not handle the high-speed photography needed for the use of miniatures. The scenes on the Zeppelin are alive and electric with stunts, special effects and outlandish costumes.
Costumes had to be modified with Hollywood censor Jason Joy who worked with DeMille to make sure the girls at the party (and Madam Satan too) wore less revealing costumes thanks to body stockings and fishnets.
The theme of the femme fatale is very important in this film: this figure is filtered through the Art Deco codes. Angela appears at the masquerade ball as the bewitching Madam Satan, turning from "Angel(a)" into "devil". At the ball she is wearing a sensual costume that evokes Hell's damnation in its velvet and sequined tongues of fire (publicity for the film described the gown as black with red and gold) that, barely covering her erogenous zones, reveal rather than hide.
Accessorised with a mask, the gown envelops and highlights her figure in a glamorously sensational way: Angela is mysterious, outrageous and gloriously stunning compared to Trixie in her rather ridiculous sparkling sequined costume sprouting incredibly long and impractical feathers.
The costume is the visual focal point of the film: Angela wears it to win back her husband, but also to find a new self, and soon, like the proverbial phoenix rising from the ashes, she emerges from the flames of fabric as the winner.
Madam Satan’s costume could definitely be defined as architectural: first of all, it is a "vertical" dress that has its most dramatic effect when the wearer stands up, as proved by the scenes in which Angela makes her grand entrance.
As Angela poses on the steps, the dress reproduces around her silhouettes, geometries, forms and shapes. The movement of the dress is also important as the gown moves and it is moved: flames of velvet and sequins wrap Angela's body, moving with it, while the dress train flaps in the wind when the woman parachutes herself to the ground towards the end of the film.
Besides, the dress transforms Angela's body and the space around her, interacting with the set decor: it creates indeed abstract patterns on the set and against the night sky backdrop as the Zeppelin floats above the city.
The costume is conceived as a creative solution: an explosion of curling flames sewn on the nude coloured soft, sheer and lightweight soufflé fabric producing an image of nakedness with those tongues of fabrics set to ignite the flames of seduction.
The dress looks as if it were sliced open on the front, and seems extreme and obscene, but, in reality, while it reveals it also conceals, overexposes and underexposes, playing with lights and shadows. By hiding behind her mask and exotic dress, Angela scandalises the party, flirts with her husband and pushes him to commit adultery with her.
Angela is literally on fire and her dress perfectly symbolizes this: the barely there costume is an abstraction that surprises with its texture, its whimsiness and glamorous starkness. Though no villainess, thanks to her costume Angela turns from an ordinary and rather cold and conservative woman into a bold modern heroine and Bob falls into her trap.
The film is a feast for the eyes with elaborate and exotic dance routines and musical numbers and performers in fantastic costumes.
There are beautiful geometries in the choreographies and hints at the cubism of Fernand Léger's experimental film Ballet Mécanique in the performance featuring the Moscow-born muscular dancer Theodore Kosloff (who performed with the Bolshoi and Kirov Ballets, joining in 1909 Diaghilev's Ballets Russes) starring as "Electricity" and kicking off the party with a pseudo pagan ceremony dedicated to electricity with a group of dancers dressed as turbines and generators.
The estranged husband and wife will eventually reconcile but first they have to save themselves from a flight accident: when a thunderstorm strikes and the dirigible is damaged and in danger of breaking apart, everyone has to parachute to the ground, including the protagonist of this film, an "angelical" woman turned into an Art Deco devilish and irresistible seductress.