One of the things that really gets on my nerves is when people scoff at fashion shows. Perhaps because of the high price tags, they think of it as just stupid rich people stuff. It becomes the stuff of memes, because it is of course laughably strange. Here is the thing, for many designers, fashion shows are not just parades of fancy things for the wealthy to indulge. Fashion shows are often moving art exhibits.
Take the 2024 Maison Margiela couture show. You can easily watch it and think, “This is weird. That makes no sense. Stupid.” And you know what go ahead, you’re free to think as you wish. But what if you watched it again, with a bit of curiosity and asked, “Why?” Why did the designer, John Galliano, make that choice? What is the greater message here?
To be, fair I’m going to have to sit and watch it again with a notebook ready to write down all of the references and possible meanings in every fabric choice and movement pattern. But even from the first viewing, I could tell there was a message. There was so much focus on the body- the treatment of it, the shapes of the model, artistic nude watercolor designs- that it was inescapable. And because the whole show seemed like a very Victorian stumble home, there had to be something in that time period that informed the show and the collection. There were things that were shocking to me, but they were artistic choices. And I was invited in to explore them and ponder.
It is way too easy to make fun of things we don’t understand. And maybe this goes for more than fashion shows, but what if we tried instead to see the perspective and weighed the ideas, though they might be different from out preferences? What if you tried watching fashion shows like an art critic, looking for nuance and meaning in the beauty? Especially if you would never wear those clothes yourself.
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