Photograph from http://www.dazeddigital.com/fashion/article/26031/1/if-you-like-mcqueen-s-ss01-voss-you-ll-like-joel-peter-witkin

Above-  photograph of the finale of McQueen’s VOSS SS01

Below- photograph by Joel-Peter Witkin entitled Sanitarium (1983)

The image from my mood board of Alexander McQueen’s design references I have chosen to discuss further is a photograph by Joel-Peter Witkin entitled Sanitarium (1983). Joel-Peter Witkin is an American photographer from New Mexico who’s grotesque and controversial work forces the viewer to confront the ‘taboo’ and often focuses on the outsiders in society such as transsexuals, the physically disabled and fetishists. His compositions often include corpses and dismembered body parts and he takes inspiration from classical paintings and religious imagery, notably the work of Caravaggio and Giotto. Witkin claims his vision and fascinations with death and the grotesque all began after an incident he witnessed as a young child where a car accident resulted in the decapitation of a little girl- “At the place where I stood at the curb, I could see something rolling from one of the overturned cars. It stopped at the curb where I stood. It was the head of a little girl. Witkin recalls- “I bent down to touch the face, to speak to it — but before I could touch it someone carried me away” (Storck, Jeanne (2001). “Band of Outsiders: Williamsburg’s Renegade Artists”. billburg.com). ‘Sanitarium (1983)’ depicts a voluptuous masked nude woman reclined in a Venus-like manner, breathing into a tube which is attached to a hanging monkey. This image directly inspired the finale of one of McQueen’s most memorable shows- VOSS SS01- where crazed models were confined into a mirrored box in the centre of the runway. The finale saw the walls of the case fall and smash down to reveal moths and butterflies and the naked woman attached to tubes reclined in the centre. The show ended when her heart beat flatlined.