Read a biography of any famous artist, designer or writer and, at some point in their lives, you will bump into a muse. At times eccentric or extravagant, at others silent ghosts, male or female muses have had various roles in the life of numerous people. They have indeed been inspirers and understanders, creative facilitators and ideal or loyal friends. Quite often muses remain elusive and unreachable, mutable like the sea, troubling and hurting the feelings of the artists who worship them, who in turn stifle with their personalities and pressures their muses, almost erasing their identities.
Belgian designer Wim Bruynooghe found himself pondering about the artist and muse relationship while working on his graduation collection at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp. A long and intriguing research process eventually led him to develop a collection entitled "Lena" based on architectural Haute Couture silhouettes and made employing materials such as polyurethane and fabrics like wool or silk crèpe as metaphors for the artist/muse relationship. The designer also trapped his own elegant drawings into polyurethane layers that he then employed to make armour-like corsets or jackets decorated with oversized bows.
Bruynooghe also injected in the collection his own experiences and maybe his own personal muse, the sea: born twenty-five years ago in Bruges, but raised in the Belgian seaside town of De Haan, while designing "Lena" Bruynooghe was also developing other projects involving the coastal town of Ostend, so he turned to his seaside roots to give the collection a sculptural edge informed by architecture and geography.
The collection - accompanied by a video made in collaboration with Laur Dillen Storms, starring Belgian model/actress Delfine Bafort and transgender pioneer Corinne van Tongerloo and following the vicissitudes of Lena, a young girl schooled in a secret institution to become the muse of a mysterious client - won the designer the “Knack Weekend” award for the most promising designer. Bruynooghe is currently busy with his showroom presentation of "Lena" during Paris Fashion Week.
Can you tells us more about the inspirations behind your "Lena" collection?
Wim Bruynooghe: The collection is actually a study - not a solution or an answer - but a study about the relationship between the artist and his muse. I thought this relationship is quite interesting, if you think about references such as Leonardo da Vinci and Salaì, or Carel Willink with Mathilde Willink. I was quite intrigued by how the muse gets a role into the work of the artist and I made graphic drawings to create a little world to delve into that relationship and discover it a bit more.
Some shapes of your designs look quite Haute Couture, does high fashion enter into your designs?
Wim Bruynooghe: Yes, I referenced '50s couture as a metaphor for the projection of the artist on his muse. There is also a duality in the under and upper layers: the underlayers hint at the personality of the strong muse and at her emancipation; the upper layers symbolise the artist's ideals projected upon her. Also the main material employed for the silhouettes - polyurethane - is a metaphor, because I moulded and poured the rubber myself and between the two layers I added graphic prints in Chinese ink. This is actually also a metaphor for time, for the muse's memory, because this material will never disappear, but the drawings will stay there forever. The drawings are important for me because they show the research behind the designs, and they are a reaction to the fact that quite often I do not seem enough research in fashion and in the world in general.
Is there one garment that really drove you crazy while you were making it?
Wim Bruynooghe: The first piece that I moulded in rubber. It was the first time I worked with something like that and the rubber kept on ripping, so I had to mould it again. Quite often during the process I told myself "I need two years to make this collection!". It was a bit hellish, but eventually I got towards the end of the collection and that's when things got difficult again: I had to do the big dress and the pattern had a 4-metre diameter - as big as my flat - so that was a challenge!
Apart from art, did any other discipline inform your collection?
Wim Bruynooghe: During the year I was also working on a project in Ostend about the horizontality of the sea. The lines and planes in the drawings in my collections are references to the coastline of Ostend. I really thought it was going to be interesting to let the research I was doing in another field enter this collection, I reckoned it was a very honest and natural way to work.
Do you feel you may be able to put the same level of research you did for "Lena" also in more commercial collections?
Wim Bruynooghe: Actually that's my purpose. I think I will always make fashion collections that involve other mediums like paintings or sculpture, while coming up with my own story and translate it into fashion.
In your graduation collection you also included a bag inspired by the Pentagon shape of Fort Napoleon: would you like to do accessories as well?
Wim Bruynooghe: I guess so, but I need to work with the right people who know what they are doing and are capable of working as a team on one project.
Is there a material you'd like to work with in future?
Wim Bruynooghe: I would like to start any of my future collections with a material that I don't know anything about, because this allows you to sometimes make mistakes and from mistakes you learn and come up with something that is innovative and cool.
Experimenting with new materials implies researching, but contemporary fashion has got relentless rhythms that do not allow designers to properly carry out their researches: where do you see the fashion industry going?
Wim Bruynooghe: I'm a big fan of slow fashion and I think that we will draw a line at some point between the really fast fashion and slow fashion that involves a higher degree of art and research. The difference between commercial and slow will become bigger eventually: the former hasn't even got a message anymore and there are obviously quality issues involved. Besides, I also think that certain choices in powerful fashion houses are not made by artists, designers or fashion connoisseurs, but by managers, and this will be a problem in the long run.
What are your plans now?
Wim Bruynooghe: I've been busy preparing more pieces for my showroom presentation during Paris Fashion Week. I was very honoured and surprised to be asked to do so, because this wasn't planned at all. I hope I will meet some buyers in the next few days, but, in the meantime, it's exciting as it's something completely new and unexpected.
Images credits
All images courtesy Wim Bruynooghe
1. Portrait by Zeb Daemen
2 - 4 Shoot by Lee Wei Swee
5 - 7 Photographs by Boy Kortekaas
8 - 11 Weekend Knack Editorial by Zeb Daemen
Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos
Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos
Comments