I decided to use Sandra Miller’s ‘Taste, Fashion and the French Fashion Magazine’, where she discusses the introduction to fashion as we know today and the concept of tate towards the arts. She talks about how fashion integrated into the world of art and was changed by the French Revolution.

Miller explains that the first alleged fashion magazine by Jean Donneav de Vise in 1672, Le Mercure Galant, was the starting point for introducing fashion into the world of the arts, functioning as ‘the most up-to-date social, cultural and artistic developments’ (Miller). Although this was short lived it sparked a revolution of fashion magazines being the ‘truthful mirrors of their time’ (Miller). Once the new Mercure de France was reinforced it ‘acquired the wider intellectual profile’ (miller) which lead to the products of ‘the Enlightenment’, also known as ‘the Age of Reason’ during the French Revolution. Miller talks and questions the idea of taste a lot; philosophers were interested in how we form an opinion and what is considered ‘good’ taste ‘philosophical aesthetics sought to understand how our experience of beauty transcended personal opinion’ (miller). Are we guided by our own emotional response or is there a set level of taste that one needs to have to judge? Miller states that ‘instead of being a matter of personal preference, becomes intersubjectively valid aesthetic judgement’ (Miller) Later in the essay she discusses how fashion became something for the ‘higher’ classes to indulge in, with the fashion plates representing ‘the latest outfits worn at the French Court and in aristocratic circles’ (Miller). The richest people could get the best clothes, but is does high class automatically mean you have good taste? David Hume states ‘the world, is too obvious not to have fallen under everyone’s observations’ therefore it is ‘natural to seek a standard of taste’ (hume). I believe that taste is subjective, however when one has more knowledge of an area than others they might be considered to have better taste, in today’s society I believe this has nothing to do with status because fashion is so available to people, like Mark Turngate stated ‘You can dress head to toe in Gucci- that proves you’re rich, but it doesn’t prove you have taste’.

I found what Miller discussed about fashion and art being equal was very interesting. Le Brun Tossa, who wrote in the, Le Magazine des Modes nouvelles francaises et anglaises, discussed that if fashion and taste were connected then fashion could be regarded as an art form. This was unheard of before, whereas fashion was considered something an artist could admire but ‘does not equate fashion with art’. I believe that fashion is art; artists express themselves though their desired medium just as designers do through clothes. Even then the occupants of the garments are expressing themselves though the way they dress.

In conclusion, the introduction of fashion magazines set off a revolution of its own and now today fashion is one of the largest, richest and most influential industries on the planet.

• Barlett, Cole & Rocamora (e.d). (2013), ‘Fashion Media: Past and Present’, London: Bloomsbury
• Hume, D. (1965), Of the Standard of Taste and Other Essays, New York: Bobbs-Merrill
• Turngate, M. (2005), ‘Fashion Brands’, London and USA: Kogan Page Limited

 Harvard Referencing:

Website-

Dazed Digital (2015), Revisiting the 90’s moral panic over heroin chic, Available from www.dazeddigtal.com/fashion/article/28630/1/revisting-the-90’s-moral-panic-over-heroin-chic, (accessed 14 November 2017)

Newspaper-

Akbar A. 2006, Photograph that inspired ‘heroin chic’ is selected for ultimate fashion show. The Independent, 9^th November, 1.

Book-

Wilcox, C. (2015) Alexander McQueen. London: V and A Publishing.

My theme for this week’s task is looking at the ‘Heroin Chic’ period of the 1990’s, focusing on the controversy around it and also that it was such a movement in the fashion world. I chose my website article because it talks about the negatives of the time including glamorising drug abuse and eating disorders, looking at famous people who had fallen due to heroin overdoses such as Kurt Cobain and Davide Sorrenti. It also talks about how the models were representing an unhealthy body image for women, talking about anorexia and bulimia. My newspaper article because it talks more about the art and aesthetic of ‘heroin chic’, reminding us that it was a trend and movement within the fashion world starting with Kate Moss. I chose my Alexander McQueen book because I think he really represented the change in fashion and pushing the limits for example his early work like the collection ‘Highland Rape’ 1995 and the ‘bumpsters’ trousers. He also used models Kate Moss and Jodi Kidd who were under scrutiny for being too skinny and Kate being the model who started the whole trend.

Primary source from book:

Steve Tobin’s Natural History: Blown glass and neon, 1993, exhibition Retretti Art Centre, Punkaharju, Finland, by Steve Tobin.

Secondary source:

Philip Tracey: London fashion week 2012, Spring/Summer Ready to Wear 2013

https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/gallery/2012/sep/17/philip-treacy-london-fashion-week#img-20

V an A fashion archive:

Hats and pins

• Date: 1950s
• Place: London
• Artist/maker: Thaarup, Aage

Reflection:

For the primary source photo I went to the library and just pulled a random book from the 21^st century artists section and ended up with a great book about Steve Tobin’s work. I chose the image I have because I was draw to the contrast between the natural cave setting against neon glass lights. My secondary source I wanted to stick with the neon trend and to start with searched on Pinterest for some images, I came across Philip Tracey and looked more into his work and the guardian did a great spread of his London fashion week collection. I chose the one I did because like the bright colour and like Steve Tobin’s work its almost futuristic like. I knew I wanted to look through the V an A fashion archives because they have one of the best collections. I started with just searching hats and came across the 1950’s classic hat by Aage Thaarup. The colour is bright like the previous sources but I like the contrast between this hat and Tracey’s as it shows how far fashion has come over the last 60 years.

Throughout this module, I really enjoyed the lectures and tutor’s voice though some parts of the lecture confuse me. Actually I have explored a variety of books and magazines which I found some more interesting ideas and communicative skills than I have learnt before. I like writing, but I’m not sure how I have done, because I am not a native people in Britain, I need learn more.

Within the task ethic writing, I have never seen this before and I cannot understanding the whole lecture. It spent so much times on doing research and analyze what we can get from the image. The problem is that I am not sure the articles and sources on the website are reliable and some chapters I cannot understand very well.

When I was reading the books, I try to understand the meanings, but some articles are so professional that I need to check some aspects on Wikipedia. Then I realized WSA library is a reliable way to get resources and information. So maybe in the future, I will choose library rather than the internet.

For the majority of the tasks during this module I focused on doing research and reading books and try my best to complete the essay according to our requirements. Also my course become busier and busier, but I never leave it behind though it is a little bit tough for me.

To sum up, RCS module offers me the ability to distinguish whether resources are available or not, and provides me with skills which may be useful for my further course.

After reading Fashion as Communication book, Barnard analyzed and explored etymology, which is concerned with the origins and development of meanings of words in chapter 1.He believes that the origin of fashion was something one did, or the idea of a fetish, and facere is the root of the word ‘fetish’, which means people will make a decision about social status according their wearing, it called ‘social hieroglyphics’. Also fashion and wearing may be an important way to construct relations and social experience. In my opinion, this kind of new social concept about fashion, which will probably distinguish people from different status unequally, can be regarded as a manner or demeanour in that age.

As a verb, Barnard believes that fashion has a sense of activity of making or doing, but it is used as a noun. William McDonough (2015) said, as a fashion designer, we fashion garments, and as an architect, we fashion buildings. However, the meanings of fashion is far from clear, except positive or negative values, fashion is substituted for “adornment”, “style” and “dress”. So in last words, Barnard thought whether “fashion” is suitable should be examined.

Tinckner believes that fashion is a rich and multidisciplinary subject, and a point at which history, economics, anthropology, sociology and psychology. For example, in the last 30 years the luxury industry has become the secondary largest in fashion area. So fashion is not only a point in these aspects, but also itself is a reflection of social, economic, cultural and psychological changes. In terms of economics of production, the positive benefits to the balance of payments budget may be taken into account. In history experience, fashion are studied in terms of humanism and liberalism, which may not receive negative valuation.

From my prospective, in late twentieth-western society, fashion and clothing impacted cultural tide, as well as enhance the development of society and economy. However, fashion cannot be viewed as personal opinions. It depends on how much parts in our multiculturalism and complex social system, so fashion is a macroscopic word.

McDonough, W.(2015) Sustainable Fashion: What’s next, 2nd Edition, Bloomsbury Publishing Inc

Zegheanu, L (2017) Fashion Trends’ Impact On Society, Available from:https://www.notjustalabel.com/editorial/fashion-trends%E2%80%99-impact-society. [Accessed 20 November]

Coming to the end of the Research and Communication Skills module and reflecting on all the tasks we’ve done over the past weeks I feel that for the majority of the time I have enjoyed both the weekly lectures and the tasks. I thought that is was a nice break from our usual studies of fashion and textiles, as I found the rotations fairly stressful at times I was looking forward to being able to put that to one side for a couple of hours each week to concentrate on something different.

Task 1/2: How to use online resources

As this was out very first task, even though looking back it is very simple I found it slightly daunting, however once I got into it I found that I quite enjoyed the task. Overall, I think it has broadened my view on online sources such as archives and how easy they are to access, also how beneficial they have now become in my research processes.

Task 3/4: Academic integrity and Plagiarism

This second task I found very interesting as it showed me how fine the line can be between plagiarism/copying and being inspired by someone’s work, whether that be a painting, photograph etc. This task also introduced me to the Harvard referencing system, I had never used this before and find it quite confusing however with more practise I feel I’ll get the hang of it.

Task 5/6: Visual research

I have always liked researching designers so I think that’s why I enjoyed this task. The design house I chose was Dolce and Gabbana, I have always loved their designs so I found looking into their references for garments really inspirational and will be very helpful if I decide to look at them again for another project.

Task 7/8: Reflective writing

This was the task I found most challenging to complete. The academic texts took me a few tries to get through as I haven’t read anything like them in the past. This also made it difficult when writing the task as it took me a while to understand what I was supposed to be writing about. However, it has also introduced me to more sophisticated texts that I am going to challenge myself to read to gain better understanding.

Task 9/10: Ethical Issues

Out of all the tasks I found this one to be the most enjoyable to complete. I think this is because I felt the ethical issues were quite obvious and it was all quite opinion based. I find analysing imagery a lot easier then text as it is more interpretive to the individual. Also, I think that it is a very important subject matter within fashion and I enjoyed the chance to have my say and look at all angles.

Overall, I hope to take a lot of skills I have gained during these few weeks with me onto future projects and tasks to carry on bettering my written and design work and look forward to next semesters tasks.

Throughout this module and the RCA lectures I feel I have found them helpful for my understanding of research and communication. IO have found certain tasks in this module challenging and I have required help on a few occasions. If I’m honest there was more tasks I did not enjoy than tasks I did enjoy.

Starting of the module I was worried that I was going to struggle with certain tasks as I suffer from minor dyslexia. The first few tasks in the module soothed my worries as I didn’t feel like it was that much of a struggle. When I came to the more in depth writing tasks I began to worry, one in particular being the, ‘reflective writing task’ I felt the words used in the article where very high-end words and I spent more time researching what words meant rather than undergoing the task itself. I was focusing too hard on reading the sentences there for the information I was reading was not staying in my head, this may be due to my minor dyslexia or the fact the article was I bit too hard. I tackled this issue by selecting a little part of the article and I reviewed that one section in depth.

Also, I feel that the tasks I found easier was the ones I enjoyed, these being, ‘Ethical Issues” and the one which included creating a mode bored. If the thing I am writing about is something that actually interests me, I go into a zone where I could happily exceed the word count. When it is something I don’t enjoy I struggle to maintain focus on what I’m doing and I run out of ideas very quickly.

The ethical issues task I thoroughly enjoyed as I found myself caring and having a strong opinion on stuff I never thought I had an opinion on. These opinions being equal rights and feminism. I enjoyed analysing the image and coming up with things that that the company could be trying to get across to the audience. When It came to deadlines and partaking in all the lectures, I wasn’t very consistent. Not turning up to a couple of lectures put me in the dark for a few of the tasks and I missed out on notes that could have proved valuable when it came to writing them. Also allowing the tasks to build up on top of each other just pilled on extra stress on top of my practical work.

If I were to redo some of the task or even for future tasks/research I want to make more use of the library as I didn’t use it nowhere near vas I intended, I relied on the internet a lot in this module.

Overall I feel that this module has done me the world of good going forward into the second semester in terms of research for my projects. My skills such as referencing and identifying what is legitimate and what isn’t has grown tediously.

Biblography

• https://www.vam.ac.uk/exhibitions/balenciaga-shaping-fashion
• https: //www.harrods.com/en-gb/designers/alexander-mcqueen?cid=PPC_UK_GGL_alexander_mcqueen_exact_nb_d_alexander_mcqueen&_cclid=v3_ab2cb8f7-45b6-551d-ba64-018a20eab79a&gclid=CjwKCAjw7MDPBRAFEiwAppdF9PJIZue7qsSzWbxLWAEsFk9NfWskEGYa9V5ATmSEnYoOQY45zGS9pRoCPpcQAvD_BwE
• https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/soton-ebooks/detail.action?docID=1986627
• http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/exhibitions/exhibition-alexander-mcqueen-savage-beauty/
• https://www.allsaints.com/
• https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/13/fashion/exhibition-london-somerset-house.html
• https://matthieubelin.myportfolio.com/
• http://www.carlosnunezphotography.com/
• https://www.trendhunter.com/trends/duncan-quinn-suit-ad-depicting-strangled-woman

When I take a first glance at this image I don’t feel any sense of discomfort, until I look a bit closer and dive deeper in the hidden meanings behind this image. It is an image of a man in a nicely tailored suit looking very smart. It appears that he is holding what either looks like a piece of rope or a rather aggressively put together tie. There is also a woman that looks to

Either be exhausted or unconscious laying across the bonnet of a car that I’m assuming is the gentleman’s. It looks as if the woman has been dragged across the car as the tie is around her neck and it looks like the ties is being pulled by the man. The body language of the women suggests that she has given up fighting and has lost all self-respect, this is due to her hands and body being in a very neutral position, suggesting she is just letting it happen. The background of the image is in complete darkness suggesting they are alone and no one is there to help the woman. The image looks like it is trying to represent an 80’s style by the look of the car and the contrast put into the black and white image.

After reading up further into the image I have noticed there are many articles titling the image, ‘dead sexy’ by this I have gathered that the women is meant to be dead. This could suggest that there is something sexy or some sort of sexual fantasy for a women’s body and having full control over it. I feel this image is shouting out ‘control’ in many different ways. Another way being how it is a man having the power over a woman, this could show how back when the image is trying to be conserved, men had full control over women and got all the final say in all important decisions. Maybe the poster is trying to put across the message that women are trying to fight back in equal rights and feminism, but men will always have that little bit more power. I get this impression as the man is holding on the tie like it is a loose for a dog. It’s almost as if the loose suggests that mean aren’t going to let go of the power they once owned.

The poster could quite simply be signifying the muscular power that men will always have over women, and by this it might be trying to show that they have the greater say. Looking at it simply maybe it is suggesting some form of sexual role play.

Thinking of the modern growth of fashion and how it looks to be heading the poster could represent menswear. This may be due to the fact that the menswear sector in fashion is growing rapidly and is nearly coinciding with women’s wear. This could suggest the future plains for means wear and how they look to overpower it.

Reflective Writing

The opening paragraphs/page talks a lot about fashion trend in it’s time and how it can be changed by an individual, not just this but mainly the surge of fashion magazines throughout the years. The article also talks about Le Mercure Galant magazine being ahead of its time, evidence to this was when it re-emerged as ‘Mercure de France rather than, ‘Le Mercure Galant’

For the main bulk of this review I will be focusing on the first chapter of the article, I feel it is an important part of the article as it determines whether the reader is engaged in what they are reading. In this chapter, it shows the impact of France in fashion and fashion marketing, especially in a promotional sense. It mentions, “functioned not only as repositories of the progress of sartorial fashion and the most up-to-date, social, cultural and artistic development” they are trying to put a cross that magazines are like mini where houses holding all the latest information and trends with fashion business. I agree with this statement I regard magazines as my go to source when I’m wanting to find out about the critical information in the world of fashion. The article also discusses how “le Mercure Galant” was seen a gazette rather than a magazine, this is evidence of the amount of intellectual detail that it has over magazines. The article talks about how fashion magazines changed their style to coincide with the enlightenment of other merchants and businesses. They had to invest lots of money to gain even more money in the future to make the magazine more logical and informative. this was shown by, “by transcending their initial informative and commercial remit” and “acquired the wider intellectual profile which conferred upon them the status of worthy by-products of the enlightenment” The idea behind this was to risk a lot for the growth of the company in an economical sense.

The sentence, “the unexpected role the concept of taste was to play within this newly emerging context of the fashion magazine” show how important taste is to the magazine and how it keeps people reading. The fact that people see taste as a reason to buy the magazines shows how much power these magazines have on modern trend.

The article mentions things that I agree and can relate too, one of these being, “Magazines are truthful mirrors of their time” in some ways this is a correct statement and in others it’s not. Looking through the entirety of a fashion magazine can give you a good idea of the trend and styles that are around in this time, but there can 1 or 2 articles that where they are trying to betray a different look from around the 80’s or 90’s. I also agree how important taste is to the growth of fashion magazines, as well as this how much people rely on the words and wisdom put into them for their own personal benefit.

To summarise this review, I feel like the article goes into real depth on the history and the pattern of old and modern fashion magazines. It shows the importance of French magazine in trend and taste, also how it wasn’t easy for commercial businesses to grow in the world of fashion.

Fashion Photograph By

                       Matthieu Belin

In my image, there is a model modelling a garment on top of a roof top which seems to be a hot country. The garment she is wearing is in line with the top of the wall which creates a well organised and choreographed image. The floor in the image is wet and creates a reflection of her legs as well as the shadow casting up the wall behind her. The mood of the image is quite happy as the vibrant colours create this effect as well as the half smile on her face.

The image is simply showing off a fashion labels clothing range but there is a lot more context behind the image and moods that Matthieu Belin is trying to give off. One being the upper class and the riches, I get this mood from the holiday/Villa looking scene, not only this but she is wearing a high-class coat as well as holding a purse in what appears to be a hot summers day. The line matching up with the top of the wall could resemble how smart the clothing is, it’s like they are saying nothing is miss placed.

If you compare it to this image taken by a fashion photographer called Carlos Nunez, it is a lot more polishes. The Nunez image gives off a more rough and untidy vibe as the model’s hair is all messy and the facial expression is moodier, the location is more rural and deserted rather than urban like the other image. The clothing worn by the model is more relaxed and casual.

In conclusion, the image I have chosen seems very simple and basic but gives off many possibilities and moods if you look deeper in to the image.