Capitalist messages, commercial Pop Art and a(nother) touch of Surrealism

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In yesterday’s post I focused on Stefano Pilati’s collection for Yves Saint Laurent, but concentrating today on Jean-Charles de Castelbajac’s Spring/Summer 09 creations makes somehow sense. There seems to be a link between JC/DC’s latest collection and YLS’s ‘60s creations. In 1965 YSL launched his Mondrian dresses and, the following year, he took inspiration from Pop Art tracing on his dresses profiles that reminded of Tom Wesselmann’s paintings. JC/DC seems to have followed the same evolution, but he has done so in just one collection.

The primary coloured pockets and bold back lines of his white skirt suits called to mind the iconic design of the “Mondrian” dress. The same colours, revisited in a rather more chaotic version, came back in Lego print dresses, blouses, hats and bags. The focus then moved onto cartoons and Pop Art symbols.

Mickey Mouse appeared not only on T-shirts but also on shoes, while his orange-coloured friendly dog Pluto - with a cartoon-blurb spelling “Koons is my kunst”, a somehow distasteful reference to the Nazi propaganda expression "entartete Kunst", meaning “Degenerate Art” used to educate people to refuse modern art - created contrasts on a fuchsia mini dress (accessorised with window shutter sunglasses, yawn); Barack Obama’s face appeared on sequinned yellow dresses complete of "yes" and "no" gloves, while the credit card dress was a perfect joke on capitalism, collapsing markets and the current financial crisis. But it wasn’t over yet, there were childish white fluffy clouds on a bright blue background, Sgt Peppers uniform-like coats with cute doves and rainbow coloured tight dresses.

There was also a touch of surrealism: the blown up face of a young woman printed on one of the dresses was framed by a three-dimensional long fringe; there was a hair jacket that echoed Schiaparelli’s monkey fur coat (somebody stop this trend NOW before it gets too far…) and plastic capes that looked a bit like cheaper versions of Schiap’s rhodophane cape de verre.

Undoubtedly, the most colourful garments out of the collection will be adopted by the ex-Nu Rave kids who have by now grown up and might be looking for something more, er, mature to wear (after all, even the ecclesiastical elites have gone for something more basic, leaving rainbow-striped vestments behind).

Despite all the fun at JC/DC you wonder if he is having a great deal of fun recycling his old designs (sorry for being so harsh, but I was an easily impressionable little girl when he pioneered his Mickey Mouse design, now I’m a cynical young woman who’s turning old very quickly...) or if he’s just taking the piss out of the fashion elites. The doubts remain.

And while we try to find elusive answers to the JC/DC dilemma, let’s move on and explore a bit more of Surrealism and another Schiaparelli reference. Yes, I know that I’ve mentioned her name gazillion of times in this blog, in this post and even in my "About" link, but Schiap’s lobster dress, originally designed by Salvador Dali came to my mind after seeing images from Junko Shimada’s catwalk.

Say whatever you want, but that WAS Schiap's lobster dress. It was disguised into a shorter version with pouf skirt, the lobster was in a different position and there were no parsley bunches, but yes, it was her lobster dress. The infamous design came back also in other creations, sometimes mixed with assorted fish.

Leaving aside the animal/birds/fish prints, the emphasis in Junko Shimada’s collection was on volumes as it was clear from puffed up jackets, coats and black dresses with ample sleeves and hoods reminiscent of 17th century Dutch costumes. The touch of surrealism was also present in the ballet pumps transformed into high heel shoes and with what looked like dead swan headgear.

Like all Junko Shimada’s shoes, the former might be really covetable, but let’s hope the latter will remain confined to the catwalk realm. I can deal with another lobster dress, but a dead swan hat might be a bit too much for me.