Fashion meets Art

Half  past 12 and we were still looking for 11, Odisseos str., in the alleys of  Nicosia’s “old town” … 43 past 12..we finally made it to the doorstep of an all-white building, with its two tall white doors and the black bold letters.. IS NOT GALLERY. However, our joy and our relief was immediately disturbed from a small piece of paper with   “I' ll be back at 5 o' clock” and a phone number written on it. Without thinking it twice, I dialled the number and a man’s voice answered me*… To make things short, in 10 minutes time, the tall doors had opened  and a white space with 21 works of art was revealed to us…

 

Mariza Partily, Rehearsal, 2012

Fashion meets Art... 16 artists with various works ( painting, mater painting, photography, installations, sculpture/constructions and graphics) influenced by Fashion, they display and they show, through their work, how they perceive the idea of fashion. The titled had already prepared us… 

Manolis Anastasakos, Loft story, 2010

It’s a well known fact that fashion designers take inspiration from Art, they “steel” from it, they adapt it, they “transcribe” it… Let’s take a look at fashion, this time through the lense of these specific artists…

Marios Eleftheriades, Sin saves, 2012

Haris Kiprianou, Untitled, 2012

Spiros Drousiotis, Untitled 2, 2012

Andros Efstathiou*, the man who opened the door for us, is in fact one of the sixteen artists, owner of the gallery and the curator of this exhibition. We want to thank him for his friendly approach, for the time he gave us and for accepting the call of SouMou for a mini interview regarding the exhibition and the relation between Art and Fashion… 

1. Fashion loves art... does art love fashion?

 Surely, Fashion loves Art.  Besides, there are so many occasions in which fashion invested in studying art for the production of new collections.

Now, whether Art loves Fashion? Whether artists love Fashion? I’m not so confident that there is a “big love” for Fashion, in the part of visual artists. Mostly they turn away from it and in some other times their “connection” is created for the service of mutual interests. 

 History, so far, taught us that Fashion borrowed “elements” from Art and even stole entire works of art for its products.

 Art exists and is created to make people think, to expose social-cultural problems and set questions. Art is society’s reception. Fashion, on the other hand, exists to satisfy vanity. – At least the biggest part of Fashion’s industry is. – There is of course the part of theatre costumes where we can find costumes based on ancient texts and plays. On those cases, surely, we can notice –artistically- important pieces of clothing or jewelry, which they don’t aim on their aesthetics, but come from serious research and they are based on the text and its ideas.

For other cases, the “partnership” is purely a matter of an economical deal.

2.Usually, artist who choose fashion as a theme for their work, have a critical approach to it. Like in  this exhibition, we looked at pieces that have irony, a caustic sense of humor… As the curator, who selected these works, what were your criteria?  

 As the curator, I chose artists based on their body of work until now. What I noticed was that a lot of their works had references to the Fashion world. The artists, themselves, might not have conceptualized it, but for me, that was determinant for my decision to ask them to create pieces influenced by the Fashion world overall.

What I’m saying is that, with the exception of 3-4 pieces, the works displayed in this exhibition were created exclusively for it. I do, honestly, believe many of these artists haven’t got any associations –and they don’t want to-  with the Fashion world. I think this is exactly the reason of the sharpness we witness in their works, the irony and indeed the caustic sense of humor regarding Fashion.         

3.What is your opinion for clothes-accessories, which have clear referrals to the Art world? Do you buy such pieces? 

Look, I can admire a piece of clothing, a jewel… they can be fascinated by their aesthetics…but that’s it. Most of these products were just made to satisfy people’s vanity, and to have them dressed prettily. They don’t actually serve something deeper, nor do they set questions or testify thoughts on society and human race-and I don’t think they need to either… this is not their purpose.

No one will remember a dress, why should they? A dress has never changed the course of history. An art work has.

All right, fashion is always looking for inspirations. It operates in such a fast pace that is all about inspirations.

No, I would never buy clothes influenced from Art.

Out of the contrary.