BEAUTY: Clothing--Dolce and Gabbana Alta Sartoria 2021

Since its inception in 2015, Dolce and Gabbana's Alta Sartoria line has been presenting some haute-haute couture pieces in exquisite locations like Florence, Sicily, and now Venice. Last week, the 2021 Alta Sartoria menswear portion was presented at the Venice Arsenale (the usual location for the Biennale) on a floating mirrored walkway. Of course the clothing was exquisite--many or most one-of-a-kind pieces--but the most striking thing about this presentation was the hail storm that pelted the models and celebrity/billionaire crowd in attendance with hefty marble-sized chunks of ice toward the end of the show!

Featuring clothing that referenced this ancient floating city and its local arts, garments paid homage to the mosaic work of the Basilica di San Marco, the architecture of the Doge's Palace, Murano glass (shirts were made of Murano glass beads, and models sported chandelier earrings of the fabled material!), and the sumptuous silks (some printed with views of Piazza San Marco) and brocades that have been associated with this magical city for centuries. There was even a mind-boggling shirt made of feathers and gold gilding.

https://us.dolcegabbana.com/

BEAUTY: Clothing--Rick Owens

Rick Owens, Paris Fashion Week, Spring Summer '22, shown in Venice. I love the fact that the collection is largely colorless and organic yet retains the strong silhouette he is known for. I am, as usual, wild for it.

I will let The Master explain:

THIS WILL BE OUR FOURTH AND LAST COVID ERA SHOW SET ON THE VENEZIA LIDO BEACH WHERE I LIVE HALF THE YEAR AND WHERE MY TEAM CAN JOIN ME FROM OUR FACTORY A SHORT DRIVE AWAY. DOING LIVE SHOWS HERE FELT LIKE THE RIGHT THING TO DO DURING THIS STRAINED MOMENT — IT FELT REDUCED, INTIMATE, HONEST AND RAW — DOING LIVE STREAM SHOWS ON THE BEACH IN FRONT OF MY HOUSE FELT LIKE A RETREAT BUT NOT A DEFEAT.

WITH A POST-COVID IN VIEW THERE MIGHT BE A SENSE OF FRUSTRATED APPETITES DEMANDING TO BE DOUBLY SATISFIED THIS SUMMER THAT MIGHT MAKE FOR A VORACIOUSNESS FORGETTING THE HUMBLING EXPERIENCE WE ALL JUST WENT THROUGH TOGETHER. THIS COLLECTION EMBRACES HEDONISM BUT IN A SOFT, GRATEFUL WAY REFLECTING THIS NEW PERIOD OF CONTRADICTIVELY TRYING TO MIX GLAM WITH RESPONSIBILITY AND THOUGHTFULNESS.

WHITE-MAGIC-HOUSES-OF-THE-HOLY-STAIRWAY-TO-HEAVEN HIPPIES WEAR BAGGY, DRAGGING FLARES OVER PLATFORMS, WITH ECO COTTON DISCO BODYSUIT/BATHERS (ECODISCO!) UNDER TRANSPARENT SHIRTS OR TRANSPARENTLY TAILORED MONSTER-SHOULDERED BLAZERS AND COATS.

MY COMFORT LEVEL WITH OUR TAILORING CREW HAS LET ME REALLY SAVOR DEVELOPING THE INTERIOR STRUCTURAL PROCESS... AND EXPOSING IT... AND CELEBRATING ITS CONFECTION. WE SLICED INTO OUR COATS AND JKTS, RIPPING OFF SLEEVES, DEEPENING ARMHOLES, CUTTING AWAY FRONTS AND BACKS AND RENDERING EVERYTHING IN UNDYED COTTON ORGANDIES AND UNDYED SILK CHIFFONS THAT EXPOSE THE COMPLEXITY OF THE STRUCTURAL INTERLININGS BENEATH.

THE DRAGGING DENIMS ARE IN 16OZ BLACK, NATURAL, OR ORANGE SELVEDGE DENIM CUSTOM WOVEN FOR US BY YAMAASHI ORIMONO (EST. 1945) ON VINTAGE SAKAMOTO SHUTTLE LOOMS. THIS IS FROM AN ONGOING DRKSHW CAPSULE MADE IN KURASHIKI, OKAYAMA PREFECTURE, JAPAN.

DENIMS NOT COMING FROM OUR JAPAN CAPSULE ARE GOTS (GLOBAL ORGANIC TEXTILE STANDARD) CERTIFIED ORGANIC COTTON FROM A LOCAL ITALIAN MILL FOUNDED IN 1597.
SNAP FRONT SHIRTS (THIS GENERATION’S BLAZER!), COME IN CHIFFON, CRISP COTTON, AND A TRANSPARENT FOG NYLON ALSO USED TO MAKE DIAPHANOUS FOG HOODIES.
A HAND-KNOTTED BLANCHED COQ FEATHER JKT IS PRODUCED BY MAISON FÉVRIER (EST 1929), THE LAST OPERATING PLUMASSIER IN PARIS, WHO ONCE DID PIECES FOR JOSEPHINE BAKER.
BRUTALIST CHOKERS ARE FROM AN ONGOING JEWELRY COLLECTION PRODUCED BY GOOSSENS, THE MAISON THAT ONCE PRODUCED JEWELRY FOR COCO CHANEL, CRISTOBAL BALENCIAGA, AND MADAME GRÈS IN THE 1950S.
PERSONAL NON-TOXIC FOG MACHINES COME IN 3 SIZES — SMALL TO INSERT IN THE SIDE POCKETS ADDED TO OUR PLATFORM BOOTS... A CARRY-ON SIZE... AND A COFFEE TABLE SIZE.
WE CONTINUE INCLUDING JKTS AND BAGS IN PIRARUCU DRAGON SCALE LEATHER, A FOOD BYPRODUCT PRODUCED BY INDIGENOUS COMMUNITIES IN BRAZIL.

DURING THESE LIDO SHOWS, WE MADE FRIENDS WITH SWAMPGOD, A YOUNG CREATOR WHO LIVES DOWN THE BEACH FROM ME, AND I INVITED HIM TO COME VISIT THE FACTORY AND RIP OLD STOCK APART TO RECONFIGURE THEM INTO NEW PIECES THAT END UP BEING DECONSTRUCTIONS OF MY DECONSTRUCTIONS, SOME INCLUDED IN THIS COLLECTION. HE ALSO AGREED TO MODEL FOR THIS SHOW.
ALL OUR COTTON JERSEYS ARE WOVEN FROM GOTS CERTIFIED ORGANIC COTTON. LANGUID SHIRTS AND PANTS ARE IN BIODEGRADABLE COTTON WASTE CUPRO OR FSC CERTIFIED VISCOSE. OBVIOUSLY, WE/I STILL HAVE A WAYS TO GO TOWARDS OUR SUSTAINABILITY EFFORTS BUT WE ALL CAN AIM HIGHER AND START SOMEWHERE.
THE SOUNDTRACK IS A CUSTOM DERANGED MIX BY MOCHIPET — A DISTORTED HALLUCINOGENIC SOUNDSCAPE THAT CAPTURES THE WARPED PERIOD OF HEDONISM COMING UP. IT’S GONNA BE A GLUTTONOUS SUMMER, STAY SAFE.

https://www.rickowens.eu/

BEAUTY: Clothing--Rick Owens

Rick Owens, Women's Spring Summer 2021. PHLEGETHON. Fabulous.

I SPEND MY SUMMERS ON VENICE’S LIDO, THE SITE OF THOMAS MANN’S NOVELLA DEATH IN VENICE. THE MAIN CHARACTER, A WRITER ASCETICALLY DEVOTED TO HIS CRAFT, DEVELOPS AN OBSESSION WITH A YOUTH AND ENDS UP DYING ON THE BEACH FROM CHOLERA DURING AN EPIDEMIC WITH DESPERATELY AGE-DEFYING HAIR DYE RUNNING DOWN HIS FACE IN THE HOT SUN. 

THE WORD ‘QUARANTINE’ ORIGINATED FROM THIS AREA’S MEDIEVAL RESPONSE TO THE BUBONIC PLAGUE. 

THIS WOMEN’S RUNWAY SHOW IS PRESENTED IN THE PIAZZA IN FRONT OF THE LIDO CASINO — A MONUMENTAL 1930S RATIONALIST PALAZZO THAT I WALK BY AND WORSHIP EVERY DAY ON MY WAY TO THE BEACH. DOING A DIGITAL SHOW WITHOUT AN AUDIENCE HERE, WITH MY INTIMATE ITALIAN DESIGN ROOM CREW FROM OUR FACTORY 2 HOURS AWAY, FEELS COZY AND TRUTHFUL AND SPECTACULAR ALL AT ONCE 

MY LAST FALL RUNWAY SHOULDER-FREAK-OUT WASN’T ABOUT POWER, IT WAS ABOUT DEFIANCE — DEFIANCE IN THE FACE OF THREAT. BLACK GRAIN DE POUDRE TAILORING IS OVERSIZED WITH SLEEVES RIPPED OFF OF HULKING SHOULDERS... STRAPS ALLOW THE WEARER TO STRIP JKTS OFF AND CINCH AROUND WAISTS AS A BEACH BUSTLE... AND SATIN RIB WAISTED BOMBERS HAVE SHOULDERS THAT ARE AN EXAGGERATED MIDDLE FINGER TO DOOM. 

I JUST MIGHT BE LEANING INTO A TASTE FOR THE LURID THAT AN UNDERCURRENT OF THREAT AND DREAD CAN INSPIRE. BUBBLEGUM PINK AND ALARM RED THIGH HIGH BOOTS AND LEATHER MICRO- SHORT CUTOFFS ADD A GARISH NOTE, BUT THESE MICRO-SHORTS CAN BE TRANSFORMED INTO WAIST DEFINING BELTS WITH HANDY POCKETS THAT CAN BE WORN OVER SIMPLE JERSEY SHIFTS. 

ALSO MORE CIVILIZED ARE ARCHITECTURAL COTTON POPLIN TUNICS AND ROBES WITH SCULPTED CAPES AND MANTLES IN BONDED WOOLS AND COTTON POPLIN. CONFECTIONS IN SILK CHIFFON WITH STRICT LINES OF TULLE GEO-RUFFLES SPRINKLED WITH TRAILING GAZAR RIBBONS ADD A GRIM GAIETY. 

MOST OF THE LEATHERS USED IN THIS COLLECTION ARE DOUBLE-FACED WITH MINIMAL, UNLINED CONSTRUCTION, INCLUDING A 0.8MM THICK NEAPOLITAN-PRODUCED JUICY DOUBLE-FACED LEATHER WE CALL DOUBLE BUTTER. 

WE DID A NEAPOLITAN GELATO DÉGRADÉ STRIPE PRINT ON CHIFFON AND CRÊPE, EXTENDING IT TO KNITS. THESE KNITS DOUBLE UP, PEEL UP AND DOWN LIKE A BANANA, COVERING OR EXPOSING AT WILL. 

A GROUP OF FISHNET TANK DRESSES AND HOODIES HAVE BEEN DEVELOPED FROM THE MASKS USED IN FW12 ‘MOUNTAIN’. 

JKTS AND SHORTS ARE PRESENTED IN STRETCH DENIM SURFACED WITH PAILLETTES CUSTOM MADE FOR US FROM RECYCLED PLASTIC. 

THIS WOMEN’S SPRING COLLECTION, AS ALWAYS, SHARES THE SAME TITLE AS THE MEN’S — ‘PHLEGETHON’, ONE OF THE RIVERS IN THE INFERNO DESCRIBED IN DANTE’S DIVINE COMEDY, NOT QUITE THE CENTER OF HELL BUT ON THE WAY THERE. 

I USED A SOUNDTRACK OF DONNA SUMMER’S ‘I FEEL LOVE’ REMIXED FOR ME 10 YEARS AGO BY JEFF JUDD, MY LONGTIME MUSIC COLLABORATOR. THIS SONG HAS ALWAYS BEEN A REASSURING AND STABILIZING ANTHEM FOR ME BUT HERE IT GETS AS DARK AND DELIRIOUS AS FALLING INTO A K-HOLE, FITTING THIS MOMENT PERFECTLY. COPYRIGHT RESTRICTIONS DID NOT ALLOW ME TO POST IT ON YOUTUBE SO I HAD TO POST A SUBSTITUTE VERSION. BUT DONNA WENT HARD FOR THE LIVE SHOW AT THE LIDO...

https://www.rickowens.eu/en/US

That's Quite A Scale

Amazing neon sculptural sign by artist Lauren Bon on view at the current Venice Biennale as part of an installation in collaboration with The Brooklyn Rail.

https://www.metabolicstudio.org
https://brooklynrail.org/
https://www.labiennale.org/en

Winter World 2018

Eiffel Tower, Paris, France - Photo by Alain Jocard/AFP/Getty Images

Amsterdam

Christmas Market, Vienna, Austria

Copenhagen, Denmark

Tuileries Gardens, Paris, France - Photo by Thomas Samson/AFP/Getty Images

London, England

Kinkaku-ji-Rokuon-ji (The Golden Pavilion), Kyoto, Japan

Denmark

Reykjavik, Iceland

Painswick, Cotswolds, England

Christmas Market, Prague, Czech Republic

Quebec, Canada

Aarhus, Denmark

Venice, Italy

Versailles, France - Photo by Christophe Simon/AFP/Getty Images

The Brandenburg Gate, Berlin, Germany

Budapest, Hungary

BEAUTY: Installation--Lorenzo Quinn

The Venice Biennale started this month and artist Lorenzo Quinn unveiled a monumental installation piece. Called Support, the piece consists of two arms rising up from the canal to support the Ca' Sagredo Hotel to highlight the impending dangers of climate change felt quite keenly in this floating city.

Support will be on view through the end of the Biennale on November 26, 2017.

https://www.lorenzoquinn.com/
http://www.labiennale.org/en/Home.html

BEAUTY: Architecture--Glass Tea House Mondrian

This past July 2014 at the Venice Biennale Architettura, artist Hiroshi Sugimoto unveiled his stunning, lyrical Glass Tea House Mondrian on the Venetian island of San Giorgio Maggiore. It is a faithful, traditional Japanese tea house with one exception: its walls are made of glass. The art of the tea ceremony is an ancient one and depends upon the silence and solitude of the space and its effect on the tea master and the guests (which is often limited to two or four people). But the seasons and nature are often a large part of the tea ceremony as well: the small food items often served during the ceremony change with the time of year and sometimes a small ikebana arrangement will reflect the outdoors as well. So it seems fitting that the outdoors and inside of the tea house could influence each other in such a vital way.

Sugimoto designed the glass cube in conjunction with Bisazza, the Italian tile manufacturer, who lined the forty-foot long reflecting pool in blue mosaic tiles.

The exterior fencing around the pavilion is made entirely of cedar wood, sourced from the Tōhoku region which was devastated by the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami.

As dictated by tea ceremony tradition, the host (tea master) and guests enter through different doors. Above, the tea master enters the space through this side of the tea house...

...while the guests traditionally enter through a low, small door, a deliberate design which subliminally signals a change of perspective to the guests, and an important shift of consciousness.

Above: Kazuyo Sejima and creator of the tea house Hiroshi Sugimoto with their tea master

http://www.sugimotohiroshi.com/
http://www.labiennale.org/en/architecture/

BEAUTY: Installation--Joana Vasconcelos

From the website for Joana Vasconcelos' installation at the current Venice Biennale (through November 24th, 2013):

"The Portuguese artist Joana Vasconcelos is a commentator on the real. She investigates the present through a critical reading of Western mythologies and iconographies. She explores mainstream values, habits, and customs in order to examine personal and collective identity with respect to gender, class, and nationality. Her practice involves appropriating familiar objects and images and meticulously re-elaborating them, often calling upon artisanal techniques affiliated with female labor and employing craft-related materials such as textiles and tin-glazed ceramic tiles.

Trafaria Praia is Vasconcelos's proposal for the Participation of Portugal at the 55th International Art Exhibition – la Biennale di Venezia. Her project addresses the historical relationship between Portugal and Italy, which evolved through trade, diplomacy, and art. Lisbon and Venice have many commonalities; both cities played key roles in broadening the European worldview during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, redefining the imago mundi by establishing networks between East and West. Trafaria Praia looks at the contemporary contact zone between the two cities by examining three fundamental aspects they share: water, navigation, and the vessel.

Vasconcelos constructs an allegorical correspondence between an iconic Lisbon ferryboat, the cacilheiro, and the picturesque Venetian vaporetto.

Vasconcelos has brought to Venice an actual cacilheiro, the Trafaria Praia, and is presenting it as the Portuguese pavilion. Vasconcelos is also presenting the Trafaria Praia as her art. Informed by Marcel Duchamp's 'assisted readymade,' she has changed the object without removing its functionality. On the outside of the ship, from prow to stern, she applies a large-scale panel of azulejos (tin-glazed, blue and white, hand-painted ceramic tiles) that reproduces a contemporary view of Lisbon's skyline, from the Bugio Tower to the Vasco da Gama Tower. The work takes its inspiration from another large-scale panel of azulejos, the Great Panorama of Lisbon, which depicts the city before the legendary earthquake of 1755 and is a quintessential expression of the baroque-style golden age of azulejo production in Portugal. Vasconcelos has made other works that involve covering objects in azulejos; in doing this she evokes the material's frequent deployment in architecture.

On the ship's deck is an environment made of textiles and light. This also echoes past works by Vasconcelos, such as Contamination (2008–10) and the series Valkyries (2004–ongoing), in which organic, often colorful forms hanging from the ceiling interact with the surrounding architectural elements. This new work consists of a complex medley of blue-and-white fabrics all over the ceiling and walls, from which crocheted pieces, intertwined with LEDs, emerge to create a compelling effect. The installation suggests a surreal, womblike atmosphere or the deep ocean—something out of Jules Verne's TWENTY THOUSAND LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA, perhaps, or the Bible story of Jonah and the Whale. It envelops visitors, eliciting both an intellectual and a sensorial response."

http://www.vasconcelostrafariapraia.com/en/home/
http://www.labiennale.org/en/Home.html