The first example is the parabolic brick arch designed by Paraguayan architect Solano Benítez's Gabinete de Arquitectura that can be admired inside the Central Pavilion at the Giardini. The architect moved in this case from one of the principles highlighted in Aravena's rationale - fighting against scarcity with inventiveness.
In developing countries the quality of construction is not very high since the industry is not about craft but about keeping unemployment low. Benítez took two very common things in Paraguay – bricks and unqualified labour – and came up with ingenious systems that may improve things, such as pouring mortar in between bricks placed on the ground, folding bricks into a three-dimensional self-supporting panel, or using bricks as nerves in handmade stereo metric slabs.
Benítez's low tech designs use form as a way to achieve resistance while offering the chance to those who may not have formal mason's training to still be included in the building economy.
This functionally practical solution to the rapid global process of urbanisation that employs unqualified labour to create unexpected architectures won Solano Benítez's Gabinete de Arquitectura the Golden Lion for the Best Participant at the Venice Biennale, with the following motivation "for harnessing simple materials, structural ingenuity and unskilled labour to bring architecture to underserved communities."
The second structure to take into consideration is NLÉ (Kunlé Adeyemi)'s project. The latter is moored in the Gaggiandre area of the Arsenale and it consists in a recreation of the Makoko Floating School in Lagos.
Adeyemi tackles three issues with this project: the rapid process of urbanisation, the scarcity of means to create proper infrastructures, and climate change. Architects should indeed consider different opposing forces and dichotomic issues when planning spaces – in particular overcrowding and urban sprawls, expansion and compression.
Millions of people looking for places where to stay may end up occupying every single piece of land available, but at the same time there is the need to liberate land for circulation, public space and urban services.
Adeyemi uses water as a new medium to deliver urban services and suggests the possibility of creating a floating school. This wooden structure allows to react to an immediate need, it may be transformed and developed into something else and responds to the issue of changing water levels caused by climate chage. After raising awareness at the Biennale for a few months, the structure will be taken to Africa where it will offer a concrete contribution to local challanges.
The project won the Silver Lion for a promising young participant at the Venice Biennale with the motivation "for a powerful demonstration, be it in Lagos or in Venice, that architecture, at once iconic and pragmatic, can amplify the importance of education."
Manual labour and crafts were among the themes tackled in yesterday's post and at this year's Venice Architecture Biennale there are quite a few hand-built structures, going from practical and functional buildings to the futuristic and abstract constructions. Among them there is also the cloud-shaped fibre cement building that visitors will discover inside the Sala di Pittura at the Swiss Pavilion.
After removing their shoes, visitors can enter into the cave-like bowels of this rather bizarre structure that plays with the perceptions of scale, solid and void, looking as if it were extending and exploding in all directions.
This structure by architect Christian Kerez actually combines craftsmanship with digital processes, presenting new technological possibilities in architecture that bridge the gap between abstract and complex space while challenging concepts of form finding and reminding us that too many times the creativity of architects is reined in by burden of rules and regulations.
The point of this installation - developed in collaboration with various research teams from ETH Zurich, entitled "Incidental Space" and curated by art historian Sandra Oehy - is indeed exploring the outer limits of what is possible in architecture while questioning thought patterns and self-imposed limits. Kerez also employs the medium of architecture to contemplate an architectural space that is entirely abstract and as complex as possible.
This free formed space corresponds in no way to what architecture has hitherto considered to be a proper architectural space and exists as an aggregation of shapes and data.
A monumental wallpaper in the Sala di Scultura displays renderings of the digital scan for the space with corresponding photographic details of the physical model as wallpapers.
The structure was developed after manipulating over three hundred small models - none measuring more than 40 x 25 x 15 cm - made with wax, sugar, sand and sawdust.
After casting them in plaster, the models were split open and their complex internal cavities were exposed. The model chosen for the exhibition had to be gradually broken into pieces during the process of optical and tomographical scanning.
The resulting digital surface was segmented into different areas, so that a positive physical form of the space could be manufactured industrially. Depending on the specific surface and textures of the area in question, this was either done additively, using a 3D printer that deposited layers of furan sand to create complex forms, or the process was subtractive by means of CNC milling of foam blocks.
Determing the load-bearing behaviour of the shell was rather difficult since this is a free form reinforced concrete shell, so that internal forces and systemic behaviour had to be studied in-depth .
Kerez explains that the beauty of the models that appeared when the casts were sawn open came from the complete correspondence between their spatial form and their surface texture, or rather from the correspondence between structure and ornament.
"What led us to our experimental design, and to the name 'Incidental Space', was a desire to represent a specific event, one neither predictable nor calculable, but not at all random," Kerez states.
"Incidental Space" aims to create an architectural object with aesthetic and formal qualities that is simultaneously an exhibition project to be experienced in person. At the same time, the project employs the medium of the architectural exhibition as a method of inquiry and a basis for fundamental research, showing that interdisciplinary collaboration among architects, engineers, art experts, and specialists in digital production can lead to visually intriguing spatial studies.
Image credits for this post
1. Christian Kerez, Incidental Space, Installation View, Swiss Pavilion at the 15th Architecture Exhibition, Photo by Keystone/Gaëtan Bally
2. Christian Kerez, Incidental Space, Installation View, Swiss Pavilion at the 15th Architecture Exhibition, Photo by Oliver Dubuis
7, 8, 9. Christian Kerez, Incidental Space, Installation View, Swiss Pavilion at the 15th Architecture Exhibition, Photo by Oliver Dubuis
Fashion fans who may think the 15th International Architecture Exhibition doesn't have in store anything interesting for them, should maybe consider visiting it all the same. As seen in recent previous posts there are indeed a few lessons to be learnt at the current Venice Architecture Biennale about recycling materials and being inventive in times of scarcity that should inspire all of us.
But if you're a fashion fan desperately looking for designs and textiles at the Venice Architecture Biennale, head to the Arsenale and look for Peter Zumthor's installation showing a new building for the permanent collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA). Construction for this building should begin in late 2018 or early 2019, and the new structure is set to be finished by 2023.
Zumthor's proposal has actually attracted criticism since making room for it will require the museum to demolish its original campus of buildings (opened in 1965) by the Los Angeles architect William Pereira, besides Zumthor's plan has evolved with the years going from a fluid form to a harder edged shape.
The installation at the Arsenale is accompanied by site plans and architectural drawings, and surrounded by a textile artwork by designer Christina Kim made up of sheets of fabric in a range of colors - yellow, indigo, and tyrian purple - hanging on hooks in two curving rows (imagine entering a dry cleaner with clothes neatly stored in their bags or the wardrobe of an obsessive fashion fan and you get the idea).
The rest of the space is occupied by a bamboo garden; Walter De Maria's 1968 "Ocean Music" provides the musical background.
Kim's textile pieces have a specific meaning: rather than moving artworks from the LACMA collection to Venice (a difficult and expensive solution), Los Angeles County Museum of Art CEO Michael Govan and Zumthor decided to employ Kim's colourful clothes to represent the paintings at the museum and their relationship with the dark-gray concrete of the building and the desert garden beneath the museum.
Despite the installation isn't too immediate and the notes don't really offer a proper insight into the building and the concept of variety (of languages, shapes, forms, and geometries) in Zumthor's work or his fight against the homogenisation of our built environment, Kim's textiles create an interesting colourful contrast with the Arsenale crumbling walls and the rest of the installation.
Besides, Kim's works and creations seem to go well with the main principles of Aravena's Biennale.
Born in South Korea, Kim is a fashion designer maker, entrepreneur, artist, and social activist based in Los Angeles, California.
Kim studied painting and art history in Seattle, lived in Italy and designed textiles at a men's wear brand. She then returned to the US, where she worked in New York for an Italian brand before relocating to Los Angeles where she founded the design house Dosa, based on ethical principles.
Throughout her career Kim has worked with traditional craftspeople and textile makers scattered all over the world, from Bosnia to Cambodia, China, India, Kenya, Korea, Mexico, and Peru.
Kim does not hold or participate in fashion shows, designs a new collection only once a year, and considers herself an artist (she has shown her projects all over the world and a while back she created a stunning 300 square metre movie screen curtain at Berlin's Brandenburg Gate made with recycled movie posters and did installation exhibitions in Oaxaca, Mexico, and Bologna, Italy).
A passionate fan of handicrafting and textiles such as khadi, a hand-woven Indian cloth, Kim hopes to help keeping indigenous crafts alive through her work (most of the colourful textiles employed for this installation are clearly handmade in countries such as India).
This is not the first time Kim works on an architectural project: for Wear LACMA (a collaboration between the museum and Los Angeles–based designers to create limited-edition pieces inspired by LACMA's permanent collection), Dosa created a 10-piece collection revolving around the paintings Watts Towers I and Watts Towers with Kite by actress and artist Gloria Stuart.
The Watts Towers - 17 interconnected towers constructed entirely by hand without a predetermined design - were made by Simon Rodia, a tile worker and self-made artist, who set out to build this monument using broken bottles and ceramics.
Rodia didn't have any money to make the towers, but used simple tools and discarded objects such as tile shards, broken pottery, sea shells, glass bottles, soda cans, coat hangers and fragments of concrete. Kim has always been fascinated by Rodia's work (that also seems to go well with Aravena's rationale for this year's Biennale), by his skills and handcrafted techniques.
Zumthor has a special way to deal with construction, materials and craft and his modus operandi is reflected in Kim's work integrated in this installation. Besides, there is something else that connects the architect and the fashion designer: both have a special relationship with time. Zumthor takes more time to deliver a project than conventional standards and uses time as an antidote to one of the biggest threats for contemporary architects – to copy oneself. The same thing applies to Kim who refuses to operate as most fashion designers do, trapped by time constraints and fast fashion rhythms.
Let's continue the thread about recycling and inventiveness that started with yesterday's post by looking at a project on display in the Central Pavilion of the Giardini at the 15th International Architecture Exhibition revolving around the transformation of the Warwick Triangle in Durban, South Africa.
Tired of arresting people just to see them breaking the law over and over again, a former policeman joined architect Andrew Makin and started an NGO that tried to tackle the problem from a different angle and sort things out in the area.
Established in 2008, the Asiye eTafuleni ('bring it to the table' in Zulu) NGO emerged out of the ongoing involvement of officials, urbanists and activists working on the Warwick Junction Project. Durban's primary transport node accomodates on an average day 460,000 commuters and at least 5,000 street traders. This area featured an open air food market underneath an abandoned elevated highway loop with a pedestrian traditional medicine market on top.
Though the place displayed great vitality, it was still unsafe, so Asiye eTafuleni added stairs and pedestrian bridges to the unfinished infrastructure, creating passages where connections had been interrupted.
Connectivity was therefore improved; the traffic was reorganised and specific recycling projects were also launched through a series of schemes and programmes that brought together a mix of architects, social scientists, and informal traders.
Originally it wasn't too obvious which ministry should have funded the redevelopment of the area that was suspended between the white and the black city, the formal and the informal, the traditional and the global.
But the plans and projects launched to improve local conditions were successful and at the moment the market established here remains a powerful experience where visitors can buy food, objects, clothes and accessories in a culturally rich and chaotic environment that also tries to bridge the local world with the Western world.
The NGO continues to launch new projects on a local basis to ensure a more equitable distribution of power, and fairer commercial opportunities, consultation and participation, and a concern to equip traders with the know-how and support they need.
The main point of this project is to show that by connecting rather than isolating and facing problems rather than hiding them, new energies can be created and planners can help dismantling social time bombs.
The project at the Biennale is supported by photographs, plans and a model of the city, but there are also a series of objects directly bought from the market, from a dried calabash used as a domestic utensil for the preparation of food and storage of liquids to the porcupine quills used to prick the skin of patients in order to administer certain medicines, from bottles containing animal fat to bowls of beads.
The latter have actually got an interesting connection with Venice as well: used in art, jewellery and clothing of African peple in KwaZulu-Natal for more than a thousand years, the beads originated in India and were first brought to Africa by Arab traders during the 9th century.
Later on beads from Venice were bartered for ivory by the Portuguese; large scale imports of beads from Bohemia began at the start of the 19th century ad have only recently been replaced by beads from China.
Quite a few accessories and clothes on display have special functions: the umgexo necklaces are worn by traditional healers and izangoma as part of their work wear; the isigalo shell bracelets are also worn by healers or diviners as insignia of their spiritual vocation to the arts of healing; while white, green and blue garments created by specialist tailors are used by members of the Zion Christian Church, known as amaZiyoni (each church has a very distinctive type of robe, made from easily recognisable colours).
Among the most interesting products there are two pairs of izimbadada sandals: hand-crafted from the tread of used car tyres, they are usually made to order for individual customers.
Like many other items at the Warwick Junction market, the shoes are an example of a service that represents important elements of Zulu history and key issues in modern urban life.
The design of the sandals is based on the tough ox-hide footwear with a horizontal strap that originated in the rural areas of KwaZulu-Natal.
This style of footwear was brought to urban areas by migrant workers who were forced to leave their homes and seek work during the colonial era as a result of harsh taxation policies.
During the 20th century, when discarded car tyre became available, Zulu sandal makers in the communal dormitory hostels turned them into izimbadada. By carving away the white surface of the tyres and explosing the black rubber underneath sandal makers incorporated symbolic patterns into the traps of the sandals.
Therefore the sandals came to represent both the customs of urban hostels reserved for male Zulu migrant workers as well as the rural life they left behind.
The sandals have become icons of African culture embraced by Zionist religious groups, izangoma (raditional diviners) and fashionable young people alike (check out the Nike logo carved on one pair of sandals).
Recycling is relatively new as a concept in Western cuture, but finding new uses for discarded material out of necessity is common in African culture as proved by these sandals that may provide us with a few lessons about recovering and reusing waste materials along the "against scarcity, inventiveness" line we examined in yesterday's post.
As mentioned in a previous post, the image that accompanies the 15th International Architecture Exhibition in Venice - entitled "Reporting from the front" and directed by Alejandro Aravena - is inspired by Bruce Chatwin's trip to South America.
While travelling Chatwin met an old lady walking the desert carrying an aluminium ladder on her shoulder and discovered she was German archaeologist Maria Reiche studying the Nazca lines.
Standing on the ground, the stones did not make any sense as they were just random gravel; but from the height of the ladder those stones revealed themselves as configurations forming the shapes of birds, jaguars, trees or flowers.
"Maria Reiche did not have the resources to rent a plane to study the lines from above, nor was there the technology to have a drone flying over the desert," Aravena explains in the rationale for the exhibition, "but she was creative enough to still find a way to achieve her goal. The modest ladder is the proof that we shouldn't blame the harshness of constraints for our incapacity to do our job. Against scarcity; inventiveness."
Aravena also highlights in the rationale why Reiche didn't opt for a car or a truck to move around: "This choice would have destroyed the object she was trying to study. So there was a canny understanding of the reality and the means through which to care for it. Against abundance: pertinence."
Inventiveness and pertinence are the key words that inspired "Maria Reiche's Room", located at the entrance of the Central Pavilion in the Giardini, and the first room of the Arsenale. In the latter a forest of steel studs hangs from the ceiling, while the walls are made with layers of plasterboards.
These waste materials (100 tons as a whole; 10,000 m2 of plasterboard and 14 km of metal studs) were relics from the 2015 Art Biennale: disassambled and reassembled (as shown in the videos in this room and in the entrance to the Giardini Central Pavilion), the materials provide visitors with a lesson about recycling, being inventive, thinking laterally and looking at the horizon from a different perspective (as Reiche did).
Aravena's suggestions could definitely be applied to other fields: greed has indeed produced banal results not just in architecture, but also in other creative fields (think about art or fashion...) and looking at the horizon with hope while reacting to the challenges of life with inventiveness and pertinence sound like great lessons to observe on a daily basis.
It seems only yesterday (though it was quite a few years ago...) that we mentioned on this site the possibilities and inspirations that space suitsor details such as liquid-cool undergarmentscould lend to designers. In a way it was only natural to make the connection since space missionshave constantly provided ideas for cosmic wardrobes.
At the moment, though, it looks like science and technology are being inspired by fashion. An example is yesterday's event entitled "Couture in Orbit" organised by the Science Museumin London in collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA).
The event - organised to mark ESA's five missions to the International Space Station made between 2014 and 2016 - consisted in a collective catwalk show with fashion design students from schools located in the five home cities of the European Space Agency's astronauts.
Students from the Ecole Supérieure des Arts et Téchniques de la Mode in Paris and Berlin were inspired by the mission of Thomas Pesquet, climate change, satellite images of the earth and Alexander Gerst's mission.
Ravensbourne College in London worked around the exploration of hostile environments, the future colonisation of other worlds and Tim Peake's mission.
At Milan's Politecnico physical and mental wellness in space and the mission of Samantha Cristoforetti were among the main inspirations, and Copenhagen’s Fashion Design Akademiet presented designs revolving around the theme of everyday commuting in space and the mission of Andreas Mogensen.
Some of the outfits were a bit costumy and outandish and at times this detracted from the more practical aspects of the garments, but there were a few intriguing ideas including embedded sensors, internal heating mechanisms and super-absorbent textiles.
Accessory-wise all the models on stage wore the Speedmaster skywalker X-33, invented by astronaut Jean-François Clervoy, patented by ESA, and made by Omega (Alex Gerst was the first astronaut to wear the Skywalker during a space mission in 2014; each ESA astronaut is equipped with the Skywalker).
The most interesting aspect of this project was the fact that it generated new collaborations with prominent sponsors since ESA provided space-certified materials (fabrics and technology) for the students to use in their projects.
Among the other sponsors included in the event there were Bionic Yarn (manufacturing fabric from recycled plastic waste gathered from ocean shorelines in the developing world); 37.5® Technology (the only fabric technology that captures and releases moisture vapor using your body's infrared energy to dynamically optimise your microclimate); iNanoEnergy (develops custom-made flexible generators that convert energy into electricity); JOHAN technology (tracking system for professional and semi-professional field sports); LEAP Technology (specialised in soft body-friendly sensors used to measure biomechanical activities of the human body); Sympatex (high-tech functional materials in clothing, footwear, accessories and technical fields of application); Technical Absorbents Limited (producing absorbent material used in a wide range of applications from advanced wound care dressings and non-woven filtration media, to agrotextiles and fabrics for performance apparel), and Xsens (leader in 3D-motion-tracking technology and products, with sensorfusion technologies enabling seamless interaction between the physical and the digital world, used in both in consumer devices and professional applications).
Though the event may have been improved maybe inviting some astronauts or giving the best students an award or a scholarship to research further specific themes, it was intriguing since it reminded people that the space and fashion industries often influence each other: ESA innovations were recently used in thermal underwear for the manufacturer Björn Borg, while motorcycle-clothing manufacturer Dainese created ESA's Skinsuit to alleviate astronaut back problems.
There are no immediate plans at the moment to repeat the show - even though it wouldn't be such a bad idea, considering that it was sold out at the Science Museum in London. Yet there are some good news: "Couture in Orbit" may indeed be turned into a travelling exhibition and, if it ever happens, it will hopefully feature a variety of space suits and garments wore by real astronauts such as Cristoforetti and further collections inspired by them.
Most textile students from institutions all over Europe showcase their final works and researches during graduate shows and fairs around June.
This year, though, students from the Academy of Fine Arts of Brera in Milan will be offered the special chance to display their designs at Palazzo Morando, as part of a wider textile exhibition entitled "Dialoghi di Filo" (Dialogues of Threads).
The event is curated by Livia Crispolti a textile expert, weaver and entrepreneur: from the '90s on, Crispolti has focused on trying to bring the art of textiles into the future by reinventing it, while creating links and connections between art, culture and textile production, collaborating with contemporary artists including Titina Maselli, Maria Lai, Franca Sonnino, Paola Besana, Federica Luzzi, Cristiana Di Nardo and Franco Summa.
The exhibition will not just focus on the students' works, but their swatches will be displayed in a sort of fashion dialogue with historical costumes recreated by the students from the Master in Set Design under the direction of Maria Antonietta Tovini, and with creations by artist Elisabetta Catamo.
"Dialogues of Threads" will therefore follow three stages in the development of textiles - Training, Production and Creation. The students' samples (made during the Culture of Textile course at the Brera Academy) will show visitors how certain techniques work and what kind of pieces can be developed on looms.
The students designed their swatches moving from various themes and inspirations, including art, fashion, and technology, and employing various materials including velvet and damasked fabrics, natural and high-tech yarns or recycled elements such as VHS tapes.
The historical costumes and Catamo's textile artworks will instead take the dialogue further and introduce visitors to new textile applications.
All the pieces on display were created using materials made available by three textile companies - Alcantara®, Dedar and Dreamlux - that sposored the event. In this way a further dialogue will be developed between craftsmanship and established industries and companies.
Maybe, rather than being a one-off, such an event could become an annual exhibition that could involve students from other countries and universities as well. Though graduate fairs and shows are indeed undoubtedly interesting showcases, they are mainly designed for professionals; such an event would instead allow ordinary people to get to know the skills taught in various art academies and universities, while discovering a younger generation of craftspeople.
"Dialoghi di Filo" (Dialogues of Threads), Palazzo Morando, Via di Sant'Andrea 6, Milan, 24th June - 25th September 2016.
A guide dedicated to the control and prevention of graffiti issued by the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, analyses a series of issues and problems linked with defacing public or private property via markings, etchings and paintings. The document tries to classify the various types of graffiti, mentioning the existence of "copycat" graffiti, that is markings mimicking gang graffiti. Yet, you could argue that there is a very different type of copycat action that has been going on for a while now and that it is linked with graffiti and mainly perpetrated by the fashion industry.
Indeed, as you may remember, last year Moschino Creative Director Jeremy Scott was sued by street artist Joseph Tierney - also known as "RIME" - since he printed the 2012 mural "Vandal Eyes" (signed with an asterisk-like symbol representing an artist's collective Tierney is part of called "The Seventh Letter") on a gown included in Moschino's A/W 2015 collection (singer Katy Perry wore the gown to the Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute Gala in 2015, while Scott donned a jacket with the same motif to accompany her). RIME's name was also added here and there on the A/W 2015 collection and in the campaign advertising it, reproduced in a style imitating his signature.
The artist filed his complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California in August 2015; Scott denied personal involvement in the copying, and filed a declaration in a California federal court claiming the graphics were "selected and created by a graphic artist at Moschino", completely independently of him.
The Moschino/RIME case hasn't been settled yet: Scott and Moschino claim indeed that, since the graffiti mural was done illegally (not the case, though, as Tierney stated he had permission), it can not be protected by law.
This statement is surreally being supported by the Moschino lawyers who are referencing the unresolved 1947 Black Dahlia murder, stating that the killer could not sue the police and the media for distributing the photos of his "criminal handiwork". In a nutshell, if a murderer can't own the images of his victim's dead body, then a street artist doesn't have the copyright of an illegal graffiti he created. Yet, in this case the Moschino lawyers seem to be confusing copyright law, forensic evidence and vandalism acts (mind you, if Tierney had permission, he didn't deface a property, so this accuse doesn't stand).
Prompted by the consequences that the Moschino/RIME case may have and by the ridiculousness of the comparison between a case involving a murderer and another revolving around a graffiti artist, New York-based artist and photographer Adrian Wilson launched a cleverly controversial project - the "Jeremy Scott Free Inspiration Gallery" - part of Wilson's Inutilious Retailer store located in 151 Ludlow St.
Here you can find "Moschino-inspired" garments and accessories, such as spray paint can purses (very Moschino A/W 2015...), or tote bags replicating the Moschino signature and emblazoned with the words "Stolen Moschino Art".
There is more behind the gallery, though, than the Moschino case: this could be considered as a first attempt at reacting against a corrupt fashion system that is killing creativity.
It is indeed not rare to hear about pretentious conferences and debates being organised with head of fashion companies, representatives of high street retailers, designers, prominent editors and high profile bloggers invited to talk about the future of fashion and slowing down the production rhythms.
Yet such events do not produce any kind of tangible solutions, but just a barrage of Instagram pictures of beautiful people blatantly talking and nodding at each other.
Wilson has instead already started his own personal revolution via the Inutilious Retailer, a shop that functions in a unique way since Wilson offers here one-off creations made with mass-market clothes. Customers can walk away with a design they like as long as they create a new one in the store workshop. Then the piece goes on sale and the cycle repeats.
The time has definitely come to talk about the consequences of appropriating specific artworks or copying previous fashion designs and, above all, to act.
For what regards the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, it looks like they will have to add a note to their graffiti guide, explaining that a copycat graffiti is not just somebody trying to imitate gang graffiti, but it could also be a fashion designer/house stealing from a graffiti artist.
Can you introduce us some of the graffiti artists that created one-off designs for the gallery? Adrian Wilson: Graffiti and street artists are notoriously difficult to wrangle - many often do what they do out of passion, not fame. I invited a small group of people who represent the diversity of those creating art on the streets of NYC to exhibit in the limited space: famous anti-Trump street artist @hanksynyc; old school graffiti writer and artist E F Higgins III; trademarked character @Frank_Ape; black female graffiti and wheatpaste artist @LadyMillard; young slap (street sticker) and graffiti artist @hypno_nyc; graffiti and 3D printer artist @RSCLNY; fashion designer and street artist @reneexors; street yarn bomber @madebylondon; one-off clothing illustrator @samuel.allen18; visiting Spanish wheatpaste artist @Balu_art and wheatpaste/painters @citykittystreet and @the_dtore
In your opinion, why do designers tend to assume that they can use graffiti they find on walls for commercial products/purposes without asking for permission? Why do you think fashion houses do not opt for creative collaborations? Adrian Wilson: The point of the gallery is bigger than the RIME Vs. Moschino case. Of course there are legitimate collaborations such as the Ash sneaker or Tumi luggage collaborations with graffiti artist "Crash". Want to use Keith Haring graffiti on your clothing? You will have to pay the Keith Haring Foundation. Want to use a Basquiat? Same thing. Yet in the past we have seen the Roberto Cavalli case with the brand turning into another offender - what is it with Italian labels?! Law is not the 'pick and choose' concept that some fashion companies like to think it is. Everyone knows you can't just use a Basquiat, but there is a view that if it is a less well-known artist - or fashion designer - who has little money and definitely not enough for expensive litigation, the clothes will be in the store, sold and replaced by the next design by the time any "Cease and Desist" arrives in the mail. No better example of the 'selective memory' business practice was Forever 21, who had 50+ anti-copying lawsuits filed against them, but sued another company for copying its own designs in 2014! The attitude is summed up by fashion industry linguistics: "Inspiration" is taking other people's ideas and using them yourself, while "Copying" is someone taking your ideas and using them. It's the same thing, people. The issue with this case is that the graffiti was not even changed by Moschino. They took it, stuck it on their clothing and when RIME asked why they thought they could do that without even asking permission treated him like it was none of his business. As you point out, asking would have been simple, an apology and offer of collaboration would have been professional, but neither was forthcoming. In fact they set their legal dogs on RIME for having the balls to stand up to them, claiming that as it was illegal art - which it wasn't - it invalidated his copyright ownership.
There is also another common practice in the fashion industry: blaming other people. In the Moschino/RIME case, Scott claimed the artwork was shown to him by the creative design team and he accepted it; it sounds like a lazy answer since, if this was the case, he should have investigated the situation and checked if the art was original or taken from somewhere else. Do you think that the fast fashion rhythms are being used as an excuse for being lazy? Adrian Wilson: Excuses are exactly that. We are taught as children that when we do something wrong we apologize and make amends, not give excuses. Sure, there are mitigating circumstances. Fast fashion forces designers to come up with more and more designs, but any industry that sells more things usually hires more people to create those things. Get more interns to check the source. You're Moschino, not some struggling low end business. Then there's the Internet. It searches for things in milliseconds. There's Google Image search. It's all basic stuff and maybe a task for the HR department to take on if the designers are too busy. A classic "I didn't realise" excuse is when Urban Outfitters sold a copied snake ear cuff by small brand Marty Magic. Not only did they copy the design, the counterfeiters directly recast the original, including the M logo on the back. Again, Urban Outfitters claimed they had no idea, but searching for "Snake Ear Cuff" on Google resulted in a page of Marty's designs and it was a 5 second fact check. The fact is that designers and suppliers no longer have to go on "inspiration trips" to find new ideas, when they can just trawl the Internet. The supplier of the snake cuff probably showed the Urban Outfitters buyer lots of images of other people's jewelry and, only once it was picked by the buyer, it actually physically made and shipped them.
On one of the T-shirts on sale in the gallery there's written "Don't Steal, Heal", but is it possible to heal a system as corrupted as fahion? In which ways? Adrian Wilson: As I said in my speech at the Fashion Vs. Graffiti event that we hosted at the Gallery last week, there is hope. Because "everybody does it" is not an excuse or reason to not try to change things. We have civil rights, transgender rights and many other kinds of moral improvements that began in the midst of endemic racism or homophobia, so there is a long list of how society can change. If you say politically incorrect things or steal from work, you can be fired, so why not be fired for stealing other people's art? Any change has to come from two places: figureheads at the top setting an example and those starting at the bottom being educated by colleges to behave ethically and say no to either copying or being copied. Jeremy Scott is a terrible role model; Conde Nast partnering with Forever 21 are terrible role models; those who still ask Terry Richardson to shoot their campaigns despite his sexual behaviour are terrible role models. The CFDA has tried to tighten up design protection (in Europe protection lasts for 25 years but, ironically, this continent has spawned the originality crushing 'fast fashion' phenomena), but there are many loopholes and again the proposals seem very beneficial to some parts of the fashion business and detrimental to others. How many members of the CFDA and its "Don't Fake Fashion" campaign can honestly claim that their designs have always been completely original? But so are colleges like FIT who push their students to work as free interns, so are fashion colleges that teach their students how to take runway designs and change the price point, so they can be sold in the high street because "that is what you will have to do" and so are colleges that do not protect their students' designs. In my opinion, every fashion student should be taught to say no when asked to copy. Every college should copyright their students' work and teach them how to protect their work once they enter the marketplace. If every employer knows that students from Parsons, SCAD, FIT and elsewhere will not stand for copying - and the college will morally and legally support alumni if they are copied - this industry can change. If colleges don't change, why can anyone justify 4 years and $200,000 to enter a business where anyone can copy your final year runway designs without punishment? There is a historical precedent for this change. Manchester, England, was established to manufacture cotton. The machines still used today were invented and refined there in the 18th and 19th century. Technology made the city the biggest producer of fabric in the world, but there were no design schools or copyright controls, so when other countries established their own manufacturing, Manchester realized that mass production alone was not enough, good design was also needed. In the 1840s it introduced legal protection for designs and the copying stopped. Design schools were set up because the investment in education was now worthwhile and the value and sales of goods increased because they aesthetically improved. In the 1880s over 80% of all fabric worn in the world came from Manchester and, by 1913, 4 million miles of fabric were being exported each year. The West has lost its manufacturing base to the developing world. All we have left are our design ideas, and if we don't encourage and respect them, what will we have left? How can we criticize Chinese copying when Jeremy Scott/Moschino does the same thing and then, even worse, is willing to go to court for their right to be able to do such a thing? The other important thing to change the industry are the literally thousands of eagle eyed fashion bloggers and websites such as Julie Zerbo's The Fashion Law who can spot misbehavior and call offending designers and companies out, constantly shaming their behavior online.
What may be the consequences of Moschino winning the case? Adrian Wilson: Law is either about planned legislation or precedent setting cases. Believe it or not, Moschino claim that RIME cannot protect his designs because it was illegal art - note: it wasn't - and therefore can't be protected. They are using the case of a murderer who marked a body with designs he claimed were his copyright as a precedent as to why the RIME work has no protection! As RIME's lawyers point out: "By defendants' logic there would have been no copyright protection for 'This Land Is Made for You and Me' if it were written by Woody Guthrie while 'trespassing' on somebody's meadow (...) Or for Jack Kerouac if he wrote On the Road using a pilfered typewriter. Or for William Burroughs if he wrote The Naked Lunch while under the influence of an illegal substance."
Social media help talking and debating about these issues involving creativity and copyright and raising awareness around these cases. But do you think that major magazines/publications may be scared to publish such stories or even write pieces about Scott and other fashion designers/houses borrowing/copying their creations in case they may get sued? Do you think that the lack of criticism (and honesty) is killing creativity as well among fashion designers? Adrian Wilson: There are many double standards and lack of moral backbone in the fashion industry: who has stopped using Terry Richardson despite the many allegations against him (even an in-depth New York Magazine article refrained from making any judgements)? why does Conde Nast partner with someone like Forever 21? Was it just very convenient to ignore (and that's being charitable) John Galliano's drug spiral and overwork that led to his delirious and badly worded tirade in his local cafe when laughed at by two older Jewish women? Galliano had a fraught relationship with his bosses and was treated as a pariah by those in the fashion industry who now sit and applaud his runway shows. Of course if he had simply overdosed, he would have been idolized as yet another lost genius in the mode of Lee McQueen, (note that the latter's fashion house advertised recently for a 1 year unpaid intern...). Yes, of course, the industry is fucked up. It is a rabid dog chasing its tail before the final death throes, based more on money and Instagram fame than originality. Jeremy Scott just signed up to an agency to boost his fame as a celebrity which shows exactly where his future dreams are. Contrast that with someone like Ralph Rucci who never released a perfume, never cared about fame, is one of America's most innovative and original designers, yet has financially struggled all his life to remain true to the world of fashion. Someone once told me "A principle is not a principle until it costs you money" and I would like to see more in the fashion industry putting principles before money because long term, it is the only way to save what is left.
Can we buy products from the Jeremy Scott Free Inspiration Gallery online? Adrian Wilson: I have discussed it with the graffiti artists, but there are no plans to sell the pieces.
How long will the gallery be open for and will you ever take it somewhere else in the world? Would you, for example, like to transform it into a pop art shop at the next Venice Art Biennale? Adrian Wilson: That would be amazing. As someone who has spent years promoting the idea of respecting art, in whatever media it has been created, I think spreading that message in any way so that people are inspired to know they can make a change, is my goal.
Not all graffiti can and should be filed under the "act of vandalism" label: some amazingly colourful, thrilling and stunning graffiti and murals are indeed real visual feasts and quite often in cities all over the world there are tourist trails to see the best artworks covering specific urban areas.
In Brighton you can spot some great examples of graffiti in different places and streets, from the North Laine to Kemptown, or the alleyway between Gloucester Road and Trafalgar Street.
Some parts of the town could be genuinely considered open-air galleries with a few graffiti created by well-known street artists such as Banksy, Snug, Aroe and Odisy.
Odisy and Aroe created for example what the locals call the "Run DMC Mural": painted in 2008 it shows Jam Master Jay playing chess and pondering about his next move over a black and white chessboard on which other pawns represent other members of the Run DMC band as well as rapper Rakim.
There's more to see, though, from Banksy's provocative Kissing Coppers to the telecom boxes turned into tapes or funky ghetto blasters by the Cassette Lord (not included in this post).
It is not rare to see graffiti artists being invited to collaborate with brands, yet it is even more common to see their artwork being stolen by fashion houses and brands and replicated on expensive garments and accessories. So here's today's question: is it legitimate and legal for the fashion industry to steal from graffiti artists? You will find our answer tomorrow in a dedicated post on this site.
In yesterday's post we looked at a costume from a soon-to-be released film that may actually be a mix and mash of different traditional costumes. Let's continue the theme of reinvented traditional styles with two further examples: the evening dress in this picture was created by Worth's designer, Madame Elspeth Champcommunal (British fashion designer and the first editor of Vogue in Britain) in 1938.
Worn by Lady Dovercourt, the garment was made with an Indian sari fabric and included a flamboyant bustle feature. The design is a perfect example of a trend that was very popular in the mid-to-late '30s and that consisted in fashion designers being inspired by Indian clothing traditions and Victorian fashion styles.
What's the equally striking design at the back? It's Charles James' evening "Spider Wrap" (1937) made with silk and cellulose (and shown with a reproduction satin dress) it was a fashion statement: the shiny black fabric is entirely modernistic while the styling references various cutural traditions that require women to cover their heads in public. Both the designs are part of the Brighton Museum and Art Gallery collection.