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The postcards, posters, and invitations produced for the Comme des Garçons campaign, for which Sherman photographed herself impersonating a range of bizarrely dressed characters, still strike us as bold, cheeky, and provocative because they play with ideas of otherness, with distortion and the grotesque (see figs. on pp. 94–95). However, the transgressiveness and provocative irreverence of Kawakubo’s fashion creations, which in turn are clearly inspired by contemporary art, are no less striking than Sherman’s anti-fashion photographs. Kawakubo’s revolutionary designs, which were often labeled “post-atomic” and “Hiroshima chic”14 particularly in the 1980s, seem to form a perfect symbiosis with Sherman’s photographs and to probe the very limits of what’s possible. Throughout its history and especially in the 20th century, fashion (at least avant-garde fashion) has undoubtedly made a point of embracing confrontation and subversiveness – think of the 1920s, when women appropriated hitherto typically male attributes, or of Vivienne Westwood’s provocative punk designs in the 1970s. As Gertrud Lehnert points out, fashion ultimately realizes itself “in the pursuit of the new, the unexpected, the unknown, and often the bizarre.”15 Thanks to a synergy of various favorable factors, this quest was pursued with singular urgency in the 1990s and popularized through groundbreaking advertising campaigns.16
h YBRIDIZATION AND E xCESSES OF FAS h ION P hOTO g RAP h Y SINCE T h E 1990 S
Any examination of Sherman’s provocative photographs relating to the fashion industry of the 1980s and 1990s must also consider the dynamic developments within the fashion scene and fashion photography of those years. Indeed, radical though they may be, Sherman’s photographs consciously or unconsciously draw on the innovative ideas of visionary fashion designers and photographers, who opened up new perspectives for a thriving fashion world and its market. The receptiveness of the fashion world to inspiration and its willingness to absorb imagery from other disciplines, such as art, documentary photography, or film, has given rise to a fluid hybridization. Over the course of the 1980s and 1990s, the boundaries between art and fashion gradually dissolved: mutual inspiration and creative interaction as well as the willingness to experiment resulted in a wealth of innovative approaches.17
The convergence of art and fashion can be traced back to a wider process of change in the world of fashion and fashion photography as the
14 Federica Muzzarelli, L’immagine del desiderio. Fotografia di moda tra arte e comunicazione, Milan 2009, p. 103.
15 Gertrud Lehnert, Mode. Theorie, Geschichte und Ästhetik einer kulturellen Praxis, Bielefeld 2013, p. 8.
16 On this subject, see especially Not in Fashion. Mode und Fotografie der 90er Jahre, Susanne Gaensheimer and Sophie von Olfers (eds.), exh. cat., MMK Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt am Main, Bielefeld 2010; Archaeology of Elegance 1980 –2000: 20 Years of Fashion Photography, Marion de Beaupre and Stephane Baumet (eds.), exh. cat., Deichtorhallen Hamburg, London 2002; Imperfect Beauty: The Making of Contemporary Fashion Photography, ed. Charlotte Cotton, exh. cat., Victoria & Albert Museum, London, London 2001.
17 Although the creative partnership between art and fashion is a relatively recent phenomenon, there were already interesting junctures between the two disciplines before the late 20th century. For a more in-depth look at the subject, see especially Modebilder – Kunstkleider. Fotografie, Malerei und Mode 1900 bis heute, Thomas Köhler and Annelie Lütgens (eds.), exh. cat., Berlinische Galerie, Landesmuseum für Moderne Kunst, Fotografie und Architektur, Stiftung öffentlichen Rechts, Berlin, Cologne 2022; Schnittstellen. Mode und Fotografie im Dialog, Burcu Dogramaci, Sebastian Lux, and Ulrich Rüter (eds.), Hamburg 2010.
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fashion (fig. 7). For the campaign, the two artists slipped into the role of a couple whose love story is recorded in photographs in a kind of private family album – from the time they met in their youth, through stages of falling in love, pregnancy, life as a young family with a child, to old age. Thus, the Marc Jacobs campaign promotes the designer’s fashion as a lifelong companion and as a constant in the lives of his customers.
Conversely, the Balenciaga images (2007–2008), commissioned by Vogue Paris for its August issue, are laced with caustic irony (see figs. on pp. 116–117). Here, the protagonists’ lurid makeup is so exaggerated that their facial features not only appear unnatural but almost resemble masks (Untitled #458, see fig. on p. 113). Like the ambiguous clowns in her experimental series of the same name31 (2003–2005), who were invested with an artificial presence by means of aggressive makeup and garish lighting, the characters in the Balenciaga works come across as exceedingly unsettling. Clearly obsessed with their appearance, the mercilessly lampooned larger-than-life fashionistas recall steely fashion editors, PR mavens, shopping consultants, party girls, and reality-show stars who, with their “telltale signs of plastic surgery, and high-society aspirations,”32 try so hard to look young and attractive.
The Balenciaga characters, who recall Sherman’s series Head Shots (2000–2002), reveal the artist’s intense engagement with the cult of divas and celebrities and the Hollywood film industry, which, just like the Internet, social media, and reality TV, generate and disseminate a host of female stereotypes and role models. Celebrity and fashion are, after all, very closely linked. As Bärbel Sill points out, “Hollywood’s stars have always played an important role in fashion magazines as well as in the marketing of fashion.”33 Moreover, Sill explains, “The star system pushes the public to consume not only the star but also his or her signature style.”34 Anyone who wants to become famous has to look the part of a star. The characters in the Balenciaga series seem to use fashion and certain lifestyle accoutrements to achieve this elusive “star status.” At the same time, there is a distinctly satirical edge to the works: the exaggerated poses, outfits, and makeup suggest not only an obsession with clothes and styling but also the futile efforts of these women to look like their celebrity role models – not to mention the despair and frustration that follow their failure to attain that aspiration.
Sherman’s penchant for bizarre characters and her ongoing dialogue with the fashion world also come through in the series (2010–2012), which
ing Campaigns,” Fashion as Photograph (as in note 26), p. 127.
Ibid., p. 139.
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common thread running through her body of work: fashion. As a child, Cindy Sherman was given a pile of clothes from the 1920s by her grandmother. This gift would prove to be a defining moment in Sherman’s life, as the garments allowed her to give life to countless alter egos and to discover the power of transformation for her art.59 Later, as these metamorphoses became the focus of her photographic work, Sherman added to her repertoire of techniques other transformative strategies such as makeup, prosthetics, wigs, and, since the early 2000s, editing software such as Photoshop. Still, the bedrock of her career as an artist has always been the transformative potential of clothes. It is, therefore, not surprising that fashion has played such a crucial and consistent role in Sherman’s work over several decades. Since the 1980s, her numerous commissions from renowned fashion houses and magazines have provided the perfect opportunity and decisive impetus for the artist to conceive new photographic works, which have subsequently flowed into her art and oeuvre.60 This gives rise to works that owe their power to the dialog and exchange between these two worlds. By systematically resorting to diverse strategies such as defacing,61 degendering, defamiliarization, and deconstruction and thus presenting fashion in ever new constellations, over the past 50 years the artist has succeeded in making the tensions inherent in contemporary fashion tangible in her images. She presents fashion as a place of discipline and uniformity and at the same time as a “space of possibilities”62 that offers scope for alternative identities, lifestyles, and forms of desire.
59 “Her brothers and her sister remember that Cindy spent a lot of time alone in her room, and that she loved to play dress-up. She had a trunk full of old clothes, some of them inherited from her grandmother, with which she could transform herself into a little old lady or a witch or a monster; she never seemed to want to be a ballerina or a glamour girl,” Calvin Tomkins, “Her Secret Identities,” The New Yorker, May 8, 2000 (URL: https:// www.newyorker.com/magazine/2000/05/15/ her-secret-identities).
60 Cindy Sherman recalls: “I usually accept things when I don’t have anything else on the horizon and I’m looking for inspiration. I make it a condition, not only with whoever I’m working with, but also with myself, to make sure that I’m going to get something out of it that I like, that isn’t just to please them,” John Waters, “A Conversation with Cindy Sherman,” exh. cat. New York/ Munich (as in note 10), p. 71.
61 See Thomas Macho, Vorbilder, Berlin 2011, pp. 263–265.
62 Mode. Theorie, Geschichte und Ästhetik einer kulturellen Praxis (as in note 15), p. 8.
Texts/Teksten
Hanne Loreck, Katharina Massing, Alessandra Nappo, Maartje Stubbe
Translations/Vertalingen
Lance Anderson and Carola Kleinstück-Schulman (EN, 2023), Wouter Meeus (NL, 2024) and Sandy Logan (EN, 2024)
Editing/Redactie
Xavier De Jonge, Jan Vangansbeke
Project management/Projectcoördinatie
Stephanie Van den bosch
Design/Opmaak
Joris Kritis
Printing/Drukwerk
Binding
die Keure, Bruges/Brugge
Brepols, Turnhout
Publisher/Uitgever
Gautier Platteau
ISBN 978 94 6494 132 6 D/2024/11922/41 NUR 653/452
© Hannibal Books, 2024, www.hannibalbooks.be
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any other information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher./Alle rechten voorbehouden. Niets van deze uitgave mag worden verveelvoudigd, opgeslagen in een geautomatiseerd gegevensbestand en/of openbaar gemaakt in enige vorm of op enige wijze, hetzij elektronisch, mechanisch of op enige andere manier, zonder voorafgaande schriftelijke toestemming van de uitgever.
Every effort has been made to trace copyright holders for all texts, photographs and reproductions. If, however, you feel that you have inadvertently been overlooked, please contact the publisher./ De uitgever en FOMU hebben geprobeerd voor alle teksten, foto’s en afbeeldingen de wettelijke voorschriften inzake copyright toe te passen. Wie meent nog rechten te kunnen laten gelden wordt verzocht zich tot de uitgever te richten.
With many thanks to/Met dank aan Studio Cindy Sherman
The 2023 publication © 2023
Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, Alessandra Nappo and the authors www.staatsgalerie.de
Sandstein Verlag, Dresden www.sandstein-verlag.de
Front cover
Cindy Sherman, Untitled #414, 2003, courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth
