Against Fashion: Clothing as Art, 1850–1930

by Radu Stern

The late nineteenth-century invention of "fashion" as we understand it today inspired avant-garde artists of the period to create an art form to counter commercial fashion. These artists saw clothing not as a symbol of class distinction but as a force for shaping experience--an opportunity to make things new, to go beyond the traditional boundaries of art. For many artists, therefore, dress design was too important to be left to the fashion designers; they would appropriate clothing as an art form that could break through the traditional boundaries of "pure" art to act directly on life."Against Fashion" is the history of the modern relationship between artists and this ideal "anti-fashion." Radu Stern traces the development of clothes as art by artists of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He discusses contributions to the new art form by various artistic movements of the historical avant-garde, including Art Nouveau, the Werkbund, Cubism, Futurism, Constructivism, and the Bauhaus; he examines the work of such key figures as Henry van de Velde, Gustav Klimt, and Sonia Delaunay. The book includes more than 100 illustrations, many in color, as well as an anthology of essential writings and documents by artists and writers of the period, some of them translated into English for the first time. The artists and works examined display a diversity of styles and ideas, but all share the desire to reject the mercantile logic of commercial fashion and replace it with a utopian "anti-fashion."

Genres: Fashion, Fashion History, Art, History, Nonfiction

368 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1992

Reviews

[Jennifer]

Artwork of clothing designs by Futurists fascinated me after I removed this book from the library shelf (because of the acid green cover with the black "Against Fashion" running defiantly up the spine). But the essays superseded even the visuals. Oh how strongly these artists, designers and thinkers felt and spoke about life, objects, and especially clothing around them.

From the clothing and textile designs of Giacomo Balla, Kazimir Malevich, Tullio Crali, and Sonia Delaunay to the essays of George H. Darwin (applying his father's theory of evolution - to clothing), Oscar Wilde, Lilly Reich, Friedrich Deneken - and, especially the voices of Giacomo Balla, Vincenzo Fani (Volt), F.T. Marinetti, Ernesto Thayaht, Renato di Bosso, Nadezhda Lamanova, (and - again, Sonia Delaunay)...Radu Stern has compiled works from some (often shockingly) innovative minds.

Despite the political bent and violent tendencies of some of these free-thinkers, much of their dissatisfaction stems from issues we still face today - waste, mass-production. Some of their inspiration stems from the same "awe of advance" we still have... awe of faster and improved technologies, more streamlined vehicles and architecture. (Many of their design ideas seem to have laid the foundation for modern fitness-wear.) These voices from 1850-1930, searching for individualism and self-expression and innovation, could just as easily be relevant today.

[Robyne]

This is a fantastic anthology of selected writings on artistic fashion. I use it again and again.