Alexia Petsinis discovers a stream of evocative words and a sheath of tenderly draped silk can conjure the same lovely illusion….
IMAGINING CHANEL: A SALON FASHION SHOW
“Ladies and Gentleman, yes, even you there, le beau homme at the back. Welcome darlings, to the salon show of Madame Chanel…”
Words are powerful. I have often thought them a woman’s greatest accessory; pearls of wisdom passed from one generation to another. Evolving in a cabaret-like atmosphere at Monash University’s Museum of Modern Art, Adele Varcoe’s performance piece Imagining Chanel offered an interactive experience of fashion purely through words and language. A fashion show without a stitch of clothing? Indeed.
Tres chic? You may enter….
After being heckled by slender Parisian dames guarding the doors (who only admitted the best looking patrons in compliance with Madame Chanel’s wishes), an eclectic audience was transported to the couture salon of Coco Chanel in the 1920s. It soon became apparent those hoping for intimate glimpses of some authentic wool houndstooth or cream boucle weave were to be sorely disappointed. Or were they?
Ten mannequins (not models, thank you very much) sauntered out, one by one, bereft of all clothing, yet wrapped ever-so-elegantly in the verbal descriptions of Chanel garments, from the 1920s through to the 1960s, extracted from the label’s archives at the Victoria and Albert Museum. The show’s hostess batted thick lashes, rolling a French tongue over 10 sensuous descriptions of the garments’ forms and fabrications with the arrival of each new ‘look’.
Conjuring Chanel…
“The underbodice is made of pink silk fabric identical to the lining of the jacket to create a consistently coordinated look. It has an asymmetrical button fastening through the left side. All but the top button are missing.” Look 3’s mannequin twirled in her blushing adjectival covering. The audience cheered. The jacket was right there, before them, conjured by acrobatics of the imagination. “The last remaining button on the jacket…may I inspect that more closely Madam?” asked an elderly gentleman, perhaps one of a sprinkling of actors among the audience who widened viewers’ perception about what they were (or weren’t) seeing.
‘Look 10’, the Chanel Wedding Dress. An eruption of ‘oh-la-la’s’. “The dress is tied with a silk chiffon belt and loose bow at the waist.” It appeared joyously weightless on the mannequin, the kind of gown many apparently want to be wed in.
Miss Alexia is kissed by the playful Miss Varcoe.
Imagination. That word was the real hero of this fashion show; hence the piece’s title. Is fashion really a figment of colour and form that exists only in the mind? Do we, as consumers of fashion, have the capacity to recreate it entirely through the experience of language? Oui, perhaps.
“Leave it all to the imagination,” Ms Varcoe says.
Imagining Chanel: A Salon Fashion Show was an official event in VAMFF’s Cultural Program. For more information click HERE.
Alexia Petsinis, intern@voxfrock.com.au
