The previous post closed with a a focus on the use of plastic in a headpiece for the opera "Le Racine", staged in 1980 in Milan, with costumes by Sylvano Bussotti.
The Italian costume designer employed transparent plastic in quite a few of the costumes included in that opera.
For example, the motorcyclists donned a white or a black armour-like jacket matched with motorcycle helmets inspired by the leather kataityx donned by young Greek warriors in the 8th century B.C.
There was a peculiarity about these pieces: all of them were covered with fabric and transparent plastic (and the helmets also had a marabou feather chin strap).
Bussotti came up with the same solution for the shoes of the motorcyclists: inspired by the Etruscan calceus they were made in leather covered with aqua green fabric and silver sequins or in black fabric with gold sequins, and they were covered in transparent plastic.
Plastic and PVC have always been popular and cheap solutions to create striking costumes (think about the catwalk show in Federico Fellini's segment 'Toby Dammit' in the 1968 film "Spirits of the Dead"), but Bussotti managed to add something else to this material.
In between the layers of fabrics and plastic in these costumes, he scattered indeed sequins and mother of pearl buttons, to create intriguingly dynamic, but also disquieting effects when the actors playing the motorcyclists (representing messengers of death in the drama) were hit by the stage lights.
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