Last Saturday I briefly looked at the applications of holograms in fashion.
Today’s second post is somehow linked with Saturday’s post and is inspired by one of the lectures given during the World Science Festival (WSF).
Lucky science fans who found themselves in New York last week had the chance to take part in some interesting and stimulating events.
The Met Museum actually cleverly connected the festival with fashion in a brief series of lectures that included explorations of cochineal red and mummy/blue jeans indigo.
I was pleased to see that some of the WSF lectures linked art and science: “Eye Candy: Science, Sight, Art” focused for example on different artworks - from paintings to political cartoons and 3D films - and on how they engage our brains.
Among the lectures that I would recommend to fashion design students there is the one entitled “Hidden Dimensions: Exploring Hyperspace” about extra dimensions of space, string theory and quantum field theory, and the one that I’m embedding at the end of this post, “Black Holes and Holographic Worlds”.
The latter took place last Thursday and explored the reality of black holes with researchers and scientists Kip Thorne, Robbert Dijkgraaf, Raphael Bousso and Andrew Hamilton (wonderfully moderated by Alan Alda).
The debate briefly touched upon themes connected with the main topics, such as quantum theories, the curved geometry of space-time and its information content, relativistic stars, time warps and gravitational waves.
The best part for fashion design students is probably the mini-lecture by Andrew Hamilton, famous for his visualizations of black holes (after 40:00).
The astrophysicist takes the audience on an intriguing journey through a black hole (possible thanks to gaming software!).
Fashionistas will remember how Viktor & Rolf explored the possibilities of black holes in their entirely black Autumn-Winter 2001-02 collection (very aptly entitled "Black Hole", intended as a metaphor for their own depression).
Yet, by listening to the scientists and researchers speaking at the WSF and by looking at the images and visualisations of black holes, you easily realise the vision of the Dutch design duo was rather limited as they mainly focused on a literal interpretation of black holes.
So let’s try to do better than them and push fashion faster and forward.
Take a pad and, while following the lecture, jot down ideas inspired by objects falling into black holes, the patterns inside a black hole, the shapes of a black hole and its structural significance and formation (guess the possibilities of a series of accessories representing objects falling into a black hole would also be interesting…).
If you want to go even further mix in also Vera Rubin’s work on galaxy rotations.
If you're a fan of the black colour, well, you can find further inspiration at the “BLACK: Masters of Black in Fashion & Costume” exhibition, currently on (until August 8th) at Antwerp's MoMu museum.
This event explores the potentials of black in different materials and through the creations of designers such as Ann Demeulemeester, Olivier Theyskens (second image in this post), Dirk Van Saene, Givenchy, Chanel, Gareth Pugh and many others.
Among the creations exhibited there is also a design from Iris van Herpen's Spring/Summer 2010 collection (third image in this post), that, entitled "Radiation Invasion" and inspired by the radiations and waves surrounding and affecting the human body, easily makes you think about swirling black holes and other assorted mysterious galactic formations. Enjoy the WSF lecture!


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