2beMAG

[You can read an extended multimedia version of this article at 2beMag #11, with video and gallery included!]

The capabilities of video of seeping into the thoughts and connecting with the memories or the emotions of the mind is an advantage of this art compared to other artistic expressions. Fabio Scacchioli, the Italian filmaker plays with these possibilities by focusing on the connections between memory, perception and thought.

Educated at the University of Perugia and at the University of Madrid, Scacchioli has projected his films and installations in exhibitions and festivals around the world including the United States, Cuba, Germany, United Kingdom, Serbia, Venezuela, Italy, etc. Lately, he has been seen in the Streaming Festival in Holland where he presented Nightlife in a puddle, a personal view after a stormy night. Currently participating in the exhibition Open 3 on S.a.L.E Docks – Magazzini del Sale of Venice with his latest work, From a land of ashes and mist, an experimental documentary about the history of a living between dreams, debris and memories.

His works are characterized by the use of modern technology together with old camcorders, and editing software combined with manual labor. A personal artistic method used to obtain images of low quality or damaged.

dead SEEquences – Fabio Scacchioli from Fabio Scacchioli on Vimeo.

The video that we present you and follows this article is titled: Dead SEEQuences , the image of a female body that appears and vanishes in the shadows and cuts. The artist is able to question the origin of the figure by asking if we visualize the woman from the parties represented or from the shadows to hide it, or if your image is defined by each frame individually or from the gap between each. It is at this point that the piece consisting of 3,770 frames becomes empty or dead. The artist is able to question the reality of everything represented by manipulating the image of a body, the tangible reality of the human being.

[You can read an extended multimedia version of this article at 2beMag #11, with runway video and photogallery included!]

Rick Owens was born in Porterville, California, in 1962. He studied fine arts at Otis College of Art and Design in LA but dropped out after two years because he hated pattern-making classes. After that, he started working for some local companies specialized in sportswear and imitations of designer clothing. It wasn’t until 1994 that he finally created his own label and spent some years selling his creations exclusively to LA retailer Charles Gallay. In 2001, he opened his selling opportunities and signed with Italian sales agent Eo Bocci Associati for worldwide distribution so he had to move his production also to Italy.

His first step to fame was when photographer Corinne Day shot Kate Moss, styled by Panos Yiapanis, (with whom he would continue working forever), wearing one of Owen’s fitted distressed leather jackets, and was published in Vogue Paris. After that, his pieces were well known all over the world and he finally showed his first collection in New York fashion week in September 2002, with the support of American Vogue and its editor in chief, Anna Wintour, who also featured him in a spread shot by Annie Leibovitz with the performing artist, Kembra Pfahler, as a model. After this first collection, he launched, in the second, his menswear collection which also showed in his S/S 2003 show in New York. After this second show married to Michele Lamy, despite being bisexual, and he decided to move, in 2003, from LA to Paris, where he finally settled, and started showing his collections in the French city. This move was also encouraged by winning, in 2002, the Council of Fashion Designers of America Perry Ellis Emerging Talent Award. In 2007, he received another prize, the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Award.

Owens opened his first store in the Palais Royal, in Paris, where he also debuted with his furniture collection as well as with his wide variety of clothing lines, from the younger and more affordable Lillies to his very exclusive fur collection, Palais Royal. Later, Owens opened his second store in Tribeca, New York.

He is famous by his avant garde and subversive eye, and his looks have been many times described as “glamour-meets-grunge”, always inspired by the rock and roll style but giving it a chic look. He says, “I try to make clothes the way Lou Reed does music, with minimal chord changes, and direct. It is sweet but kind of creepy. It’s about giving everything I make a worn, softened feeling. It’s about an elegance being tinged with a bit of the barbaric, the sloppiness of something dragging and the luxury of not caring. At Revillon, I felt it isn’t about displaying one’s junk, but rather giving the woman a selfish pleasure. It is about using sable as the lining under a very humble jacket, the luxury is all hers.” This way is how Rick Owens is understood, a unique fashion designer.

[Article by Laura Sunyer]

[You can read an extended multimedia version of this article at 2beMag #9, with the featured video!]

When the body loses its limits.

The use of new technologies in art production is a consolidated reality nowadays. Cinema, videoart, netart etc, they all use technology as a way of expression. But what happens when those technologies become the main character of the artpiece? Chunky Move is an Australian dance company founded in 1995 by artistic director Gideon Obarzanek. Since then, they have opened an amount of 25 shows around the world and have gained a great recognition because of its unpredictable and risky style. Its proposals show a perfect fusion between body and technology, the dancers moves while dancing become a dialogue, and they use resources such as lighting, beams of light and projections that go beyond any expectative.

The majority of the company’s proposals have as an objective to explore human’s behavior in view of their desires, conflicts and emotions. The lights and sounds build this way of confronting the world that is not always rational. Nowadays, some of its shows such as Glow, Connected or I like this, are being performed in really important cities like New York, Monaco or Melbourne. Now, we present you a video where is performed one of their most successful shows, Mortal Engine. A performance which combines dance, music, video and light beams and in which movement and sound together generate projections that distort the dancer’s body’s limits. The choreography responds to the beings moves without a specific form that try to connect and wrap themselves over and over again. It is an almost magic representation about the human’s figure’s metamorphosis.

[Article written for 2beMAG #9 by Lorena Vilela]

[You can read an extended multimedia version of this article at 2beMag #11, with photogallery included!]

Olivier Theyskens was borne don January the 4th of 1977, in Brussels, Belgium. Son of a chemical engineer and a homemaker, he dreamed, when he was a child, to be a girl and be able to wear skirts and look like a princess. So it wasn’t surprising when, at the age of 7, he claimed that he wanted to do Haute Couture.

In October 1995, at the age of 18, he finally got to starts the studies of fashion design at the École Nationale Superieure des Arts Visuels de la Cambre, but within a year he felt that he was losing time so he dropped out to start his own label. He was only 19 years old. His first collections were defined as gothic extravaganzas and were made out of bed sheets his grandmother had given him. He created an amount of 25 designs which were shown at a showroom in Paris. There, one of Barneys stylists saw the collection and fell in love with it, wanting to buy it all, which Theyskens refused. Even so, the collection was shown at Barney’s shop windows during a few weeks, where Madonna saw them and fell in love with the creations. She finally wore one of his dresses in 1998 to the Academy awards, and since then, the name of Olivier Theyskens has been known by all the fashion industry. He finally had to close his label because he didn’t have enough money to create it. So he started working as a costume designer at the Théâtre de la Monnaie even though he never stopped creating dresses as a pastime.

In 2002, the French brand Rochas, well known for its perfumes and not so much for its fashion lines, selected Olivier as the new creative director. His first collection, presented in 2003, was amazingly claimed by the critics and, since then, he created a completely new silhouette for the brand, very elegant and French influenced.

In 2006, Theyskens was rewarded by the Council of Fashion Designers of America with the International award. However, Theyskens designs, really magical, special and fantastic-world-belonging, didn’t really fit within the ready-to-wear market and either within the idea of Haute Couture and its rules, so it wasn’t being really profitable for the brand. The designer’s refusal to create a marketable accessories line and the fact that he didn’t give importance to advertising ended up with Rochas’ demise.

In 2007 he was named artistic director at Nina Ricci, where he presented a more commercial line. After presenting three collections in the house, his contract, which was expiring on 2009, was never renewed and his position was taken by Peter Copping, from Louis Vuitton.

Nowadays, Andrew Rosen, Theory’s CEO, has hired Theyskens to design a capsule collection that has already been presented and that will be sold this summer. Theysken’s style is a perfect mix of old, gothic and romantic time’s nostalgia with the actual figure of the modern woman, very strong and active, and, overall, really feminine.

[Article by Laura Sunyer]

[You can read an extended multimedia version of this article at 2beMag #10, with photogallery included!]

Jason Wu is one of the youngest fashion designers that are reaching an enviable fame and recognition. Born September 27, 1982, in Taiwan, is nowadays a Mnahattan based Taiwanese American fashion designer. He moved to Vancouver at the age of nine but didn’t stay long, he moved houses many times. Wu learned how to sew by designing and sewing for dolls, and finally, following its artistic and creative instincts, he went to study sculpture in Tokyo. Wu started his career path by learning to create doll clothing designs as a freelance for a prestigious doll company, Integrity Toys, and sold them under the name “Jason Wu dolls” at first and “Fashion Royalty” after. After a whole year doing this, he was named creative director of Integrity Toys.

While spending his senior year of high school in Reenes, he decided to become a fashion designer and moved to New York to join The New School, at the Parsons School for Design and once he had finished he interned with Narciso Rodriguez.

His first full collection, launched with earnings from his years of doll designs, debuted in 2006 and won the Fashion Group International’s Rising Star award in 2008. That same year, he was nominated for the Vogue Fashion Fund award. But his real success, in worldwide terms, was when André Leon Talley, Vogue Magazine’s editor at large, who had been advising the future First Family on appearance, introduced him to Michelle Obama. In that moment, she bought 4 dresses designed by Wu and, since then, she has been wearing his creations to the majority of the events she had to attend.

After this final success, Wu has been already shot by Bruce Weber for W magazine and among his clients we can enhance Ivana Trump, January Jones and Amber Valletta. Recently, he has expanded beyond his initial evening focus to include sportswear. It will be interesting to follow this young designer’s career.

[article by Laura Sunyer]