ChristmARTs

Nothing to do with Christmas, though.

Artwork by me

Link a la versión en español

I am sorry I missed our appointment last week. I had intended to do a little health detox before the enormous amount of meals and drinks to come, but my body took the speedy route and I’ve spent all of last week sick in bed, not eating, of course, and feeling quite destroyed. Seems like detox accomplished! I still feel a little rough, and my head is not totally focused, so writing a proper article feels a bit out of reach for me.  I thought I might share with you some art pieces I’ve come across in the last few days and I’m going to give myself the same challenge that I give my students in class, pair it with a fashion item such as a piece of clothing, a collection or personality and find connecting elements. So, random pairings ahead. My students have to elaborate on the reasoning behind these pairings, I’ll try too.

Franz Kline+Isabella Blow+Steven Meisel

Franz Kline Four Square Painting (1956) and Isabella Blow by Steven Meisel 1993

I love Franz Kline’s black and white artworks, the thick lines drawn roughly across the canvas create a sense of fantasy and magic that, to me, is akin to dark childhood dreams and tales. I see friendly monsters, scary forests and shadow games in his paintings. Isabella Blow is one of those larger than life fashion misfits that is essential and whose work evokes a similar feel. I love her passion and ingenuity, her fashion sense had to do too with a dark and fascinating childish universe. 

Tamara de Lempika+Stephane Marais

Tamara de Lempika’s Group of Four Nudes 1995 and Stephane Marais’ polaroids

The thing with Tamara de Lempika’s artwork is that fashion has in quite a large part, modelled itself over her ideas. The way she approaches beauty, sensuality and desire is the blueprint used over and over in fashion image making to project desirability, abandonment and chicness, which just like her art, speak the language of the elites while inspiring the rest of us. I found a book with the work of Stephane Marais by accident in a second hand bookstore in Copenhagen in 2017. Using polaroids to document his make-up technique, he ended up with a massive archive of make-up ideas on some of the best known models of the 90s and early 00s. Marais’ and Lempika’s idea of beauty seems intertwined, maybe due to the fascination in the late 90s and early 00s with dark sensuality and power.

Adolph Gottlieb+Thomas Cooksey

Adolph Gottlieb’s Untitled 1961 and Thomas Cooksey shot of Moustapha Luka for the Greatest Magazine

The link comes from the composition and colour combination, a playful and dark note that pervades both the photograph and the artwork. I imagine Gottlieb’s artwork as a bonfire under a morning sun, whereas in the picture by Thomas Cooksey I imagine the model watching the bonfire go and ready to drop the ball into it, when the time is right.

David Hockney+Guy Bourdain

David Hockney’s A Bigger Splash, 1967 and Guy Bourdin’s campaign for Charles Jourdan in 1978

Blue water, summer skies and heat… there’s a part of the action that we’re missing. Both images bring to mind feelings of solarized plasticity and eery emptiness. There are sounds of cicadas, the city traffic rumbling mutedly far away. I want to be there, but on second thoughts, I really don’t.

Rereading the text now, it is clear that my mind is still a bit fuzzy, hahahah. Oh well, thank you for your patience… I leave you now to have a wonderful Christmas and holiday season. I’ll be taking a couple of weeks off, so until then: happy art, happy fashion and happy life. See you all back on 12th of January. Have fun!

One last thought:

britty_paige

A post shared by @britty_paige

Love,

Patty