In yesterday's post we looked at the power of a fashionable metal mask sculpted by an artist, so let's create a contrast today looking at soft masks made with a wide range of yarns (with some scraps of fabric added at times) and made using the crochet technique by Aldo Lanzini.
The Milan-based crochet artist and fashion lecturer at the Nuova Accademia di Belle Arti Milano (NABA) has been developing masks for over 15 years.
As he stated in previous interview with Irenebrination, he never starts his designs with a precise plan in mind: Lanzini doesn't prepare any drawings or sketches, but develops his masks on the face, starting somewhere and ending up somewhere else, adding, altering and transforming the pieces as he goes about.
He never sets to create an animal mask or an alien masks, but the result - often dictated by the colours of yarns employed, by
their thickness and by Lanzini's personal motto "The eyes of human beings are more often than not closed rather than open" -
may as well be that of an alien animal or a monstrously fun animalesque alien.
These three-dimensional configurations made of yarns, combine craftvism with radical currents, inviting the wearers to turn into rebels and make a non-violent revolution.
Lanzini's crochet masks appeared also as showpieces during fashion runways (such as Missoni's S/S 2011 collection, when ushers donned them) and they were on display at Milan's La Triennale.
Check out the video at the end of this post to see them at the famous Milanese institution and to find new inspirations to start a new week (and if you fancy a mask for yourself or you need several ones for your fashion show, you can contact Lanzini here). So who says that crochet is "just a craft" and it is not design?
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