BEAUTY: Clothing--Rick Owens

I think from now on, when I speak about Rick Owens I am not going to call him "the fashion designer" Rick Owens, but "the sculptor" Rick Owens. Take one look at his catalog of collections over the years and it easy to see why: he functions and creates more like a sculptor, able to use fabric, leather, metal, and other miscellaneous materials (like pirarucu!) to create pieces of volume, scale, and heft...pieces that certainly exist in three dimensions independent of a wearer. I greatly admire his approach to clothing as wearable art.

I admire his intellectual rigor in creating collections as well. Owens always seems to be studying some obscure artist or time period, educating himself and us along with him, interpreting abstract ideas into his sculptures, and expressing those ideas in his own unique vocabulary. So for this Fall-Winter '23-'24 collection at Paris Fashion Week, titled Luxor, he looked to Egypt and that ancient civilization's architecture, an updated version of which can be seen in Brutalism, the monumental architectural style popular in the 1950s to the 1980s which often used raw concrete...and Owens' sartorial perspective has often been compared to Brutalism.

But he also mentions in passing "an almost Victorian silhouette." At first glance, it might seem odd, this mix of Victoriana and Rick Owens. But it works when one realizes that the Victorians were so named because the era was overseen by Queen Victoria, a widow queen in perpetual mourning. Black was the only acceptable hue for much of the Victorian era. And of course the prim and prudish nature and aversion to sensuality much less outright sexuality is a hallmark of the time. Owens has already mastered the black palette, and the expression of such rigid restriction is part of the Owens vocabulary as well. Look at how he accomplishes this with pieces that squeeze and restrain the body, along with cloaks, skirts, and details that paradoxically emphasize the body. Psychologically speaking, anytime someone (or a whole culture) ignores, denies, and tamps something down, the more it seeks an avenue of release, often in inappropriate ways. Owens said, "It’s a Victorian silhouette. There’s a prudishness. We remember that era so much for suppressing sensuality, but doing it in such an elaborate way that you couldn’t help but think about it."

And he introduced a new variation on the Larry Kiss boot...with a sort of rigid structure going up the shin, and closed with thick straps, it resembles a platform version of the type of boot one wears when one has a foot injury. They look fantastic.

His show notes cover a lot of wonderful information about the multi-generational artisans with whom he collaborates to create his garments including their aggressive actions to reduce their impact on the climate. But most importantly, he closed with a mention of the war in Ukraine, the only designer to do so thus far:
THERE IS A BITTERNESS TO CREATING A COLLECTION DURING A WAR — A DESIRE TO CONTRIBUTE OUR SOMBRE BEST IN AN INDUSTRY THAT MUST REMAIN STALWART, BUT WITH A SENSE OF FRUSTRATION THAT NOTHING IS ENOUGH.

https://www.rickowens.eu/