Session 2 Notes and Task 1 History of Creative Practices

Session 2

History of Creative Practices

I understand Fashion design as the applied art dedicated to clothing and lifestyle created within cultural & social influences of a specific time. I also feel that it’s a means of expressing individuality and conveying a message to society about your view on life.

Fashion design is not an idiotic stream of pointless images, it can be significant to your beliefs, religion social groups and even to the point of determining who you end up marrying.

Fashion Design: A system of signs, symbols & iconography that non-verbally communicate meanings about individuals & groups.

Charles Frederick worth 1826-1895 – dominated Paris fashion in late 19th century; designing high luxury goods in the height of the French Revolution he was called the “father of haute couture”

Euro-Centric – the criticism of the concerns & values at the expense of non-europeans (European perspective)

Fashion Design

Social Issues – capitalism/consumption, ethics, power, politics, culture, size, animal products, expense, bullying, belonging to a certain social group.

Gender – what clothing is considered male/ female and why, why is it different for different cultures? & why is it accepted for women to wear men’s clothing but not the other way round?

Orientalism – Imitation, depiction of aspects of eastern culture

Paul Poiret – The structured simplicity of his clothing represented a pivotal movement in the emergence of modernism, establishing modern values.

Types of Fashion:

Haute Couture – expensive, high fashion, always made for the skinnier girl
Perfumes – social group
University students – charity shops
Cars – image around type of car you have and social group you attract/ type of women you attract
Hairdressing – as important as the clothes you wear
Young girls – as young as 7 get anorexia because of the images and idealism their surrounded with on a daily basis.

Fashion – type of class your associated with, used to be more divided in Victorian times, when only the rich wore silks or lace.
What different types of images depict –
Chav Burberry imitation v’s expensive brand
Hoodies – criminals – why?

Fashion as a measure of cultural changes – war 1940’s – 60’s drugs

Beauty or ugliness is dependent on cultural attitudes – fair & skinny in western countries to look good in the high fashion clothes, to dark & voluptuous in eastern cultures thought to be very fertile & womanly.

Tribal – means belonging – still dress in accordance to the social group and beliefs we follow, that we belong to.

Semiotics – study of sign processes. Every culture phenomenon can be studied as communication, i.e. how organisms react & make prediction their niche in the world.
Structuralism – analyse a specific field as a complex system of interrelated parts
Post-structuralism – maintain that meanings & intellectual categories are shifting & unstable
How meanings are constructed –
Visual communication –
Intertextuality – relationships between texts.