Out Of Touch

Si Chan Fall/Winter 2012

What could have sprung from Erwin Wurm's walking sculptures, is a rubber glove inferno wrapped around a man's body. Dangling from the neck, finding especial grip in the male crotch. What makes it charming rather than disturbing is the naïve colour palette.
/HORST

Exquisite Corpse II

1. John Chamberlain Hawk Flies Again, 2010
2. Tom Burr Worn Out, 2005
3. Loewe Spring/Summer 2015
4. Ellery Spring/Summer 2015

Conceptual art giving birth to cardboard fashion. Ready for take-away and self-assemblage. Throwing stuff onto mannequins, throwing fabric onto the customer who becomes the costumer. Carambolage as collage is the material fashion dreams are made of.
/HORST

Double Feature III

A 'False Encyclopaedia' double feature with James Dobson, discussing:
Comme des Garçons Spring/Summer 2015

I'm going to be honest, I couldn't help but feel ever so slightly ripped-off at Rei's latest outing... there's a little part of me that cringes when I see constructions like this on the catwalk as I can instantly imagine it flashing on peoples TV screens during the late night news, in that little 'light relief segment' at the end as an illustration of how 'wacky' fashion is, and Brian and Shirley sitting at home dunking their chocolate wheatens into their milky tea having a little chuckle and saying something like "You'd look good in that Shirley". 

For a label that is capable of moving people to tears, this collection, dare I say it, felt a little predictable. Sure, red, the most provacative of colours (yawn), the colour of harlots, cardinals and baboon's arses has a lot of power but after a few seasons of these hefty assemblages staggering down the catwalk wouldn't the next unexpected step be something positively wearable? 

Wouldn't that be more provocative?

/JAMES

All I thought was organs, organs, organs. Sarah Lucas, Louise Bourgeois, Hannah Wilke. So, feminism is in fashion. But then, the clothes were anti-fem. Why doesn't Rei just throw pillows on women?
/HORST





1. Comme des Garçons Spring/Summer 2015
2. Comme des Garçons Fall/Winter 2014
3. Comme des Garçons Spring/Summer 2014
4. Cardinals Vatican City, 2013
5. Hannah Wilke Untitled, 1980
6. Louise Bourgeois Cell XIV, 2000
7. Sarah Lucas Nice Tits, 2011
8. Comme des Garçons Spring/Summer 2015

ZEN 3

1. Craig Green Spring/Summer 2015
2. Craig Green Spring/Summer 2014
3. Craig Green Fall/Winter 2013

We all love him. At first. For the walking wood and cardboard sculptures. Second. For the psychedelic dip-dye, hand-dye, hand-job. And then. For the poetry of jinbei. I am wearing him.
/HORST

A Short History Of The Comic Strip In Popular Culture XVI

1. Ben Wheele Apple Obelisk, 2012
2. David Shrigley Big Shoes, 2013
3. Zachary Leener 2014

The comic as sculpture. As grotesque mutant heads, funny elongated heels and naïve multi-coloured forms. Ceramic replaces paper and the shoe designer at Dior has something big to look up to.
/HORST

The Cyber Woman, Mechanical Dolls

1. Hans Bellmer Machine Gunneress In A State Of Grace, 1937
2. Sarah Lucas Bunny Gets Snookered, 1997

When Hans and Sarah erect 'female material sculpture', sexual identity has eaten itself. There is no in and out. Physical interaction is impossible. Femancipation is the construct of disembodied bodies.
/HORST

Wishful Thinking #4

Salvador Dalí Space Venus, 1977-1984

Long time desired, never acquired. It won't even be possible, ever. What would a contemporary equivalent be? A Sarah Lucas doll ('Nud') or distorted body with gun ('AKA Peace')? Or just some John McCracken sculpural nothingness ('Nine Planks IV')?
/HORST

A Short History Of The Apron In Popular Culture

1. Yohji Yamamoto Fall/Winter 2013
2. Jean Paul Gaultier Spring/Summer 2004
3. Joseph Beuys Backrest For A Fine-Limbed Person, 1972

While icon of domestic (supression) and household chores of 1950s Germania/Americana, the apron bares both - a sensitive and brutal subtext, once put into male context. The butcher, the craftsman, the sculptor. Put shortly, the misunderstood artist on the threshold from genius to madness.
/HORST

A Photo Booth Biennale, Epilogue IV

A second look at The Artwork Will Be Present, 2013.





1. Ida Applebroog Work in Progress, 2005
2. Ida Applebroog You Are The Patient, 1969–2011
3. Ida Applebroog Monalisa, 2007
4. Ida Applebroog Unknown (Dora)

In a way, Applebroog sums up the world and everything that counts: water colour genitals, explicit clay content, distorted comic/al bodies. Her message(s) seem so clear, they are calling for miss-understanding.
/HORST

Twombly Dialogues IV

1. Cy Twombly Rotalla, 1986
2. Helmut Lang Jürgen Teller, Backstage Fall/Winter 1999

The second pairing of Twombly and Lang. Here, we can most certainly speak of a direct 'dialogue' - having Lang's shredded clothes sculptures in mind, his series 'Make It Hard' from 2011 vividly seeks in continuing the artistic tradition of Cy Twombly.
/HORST

Twombly Dialogues III

1. Cy Twombly Untitled, 1983
2. Ann Demeulemeester Fall/Winter 2013

Ann Demeulemeester fell in love with her partner espying one little detail: a feather attached to his clothes. The feather soon became an essential design element that can be regarded as a cipher for her personal touch within a collection.
/HORST

Twombly Dialogues II

1. Cy Twombly Untitled, 1959
2. Rick Owens Kacper Kasprzyk for Dapper Dan, Fall/Winter 2010

Known for a parallel block stripe incorporated in each garment, Rick Owens' knitwear celebrates the fine delicacy of surface. Using repetetive structures as his geometric signature, replacing branding, tags and visible labels in a Margiela-ist manner.
/HORST