http://www.bustle.com/articles/66727-claudio-cutugnos-models-wore-glittery-black-face-masks-at-milan-fashion-week-yes-really
Claudio Cutugnos sent his models down the runway at the Milan Fashion Week with their faces painted black. But it was a glittery black paint, which apparently makes it okay... He says the makeup was inspired by Emilio Isgro, who often uses bees in his art. The makeup was supposed to look like insects were swarming the faces of the models.
To me, this ties in to our discussion on actors in movies such as A Birth of Nations. Is the industry so hard to get into that models will do anything in order to avoid jeopardizing their careers even if it means promoting things such as blackface? Or is it just ignorance? Or does high fashion get the same kind of leniency through artistic expression that we give comedians when it comes to these topics?
This is actually not new in the high fashion industry, unfortunately viz. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/08/vogue-blackface-fashion-feature-racist-_n_4925215.html
ReplyDeleteHigh fashion gets away with a lot of weird...crap. None of it makes sense. It seems like high fashion shows are not included in social norms and what is normally accepted by society. The things that are seen on the runway are never seen the same way OFF the runway; it's always only "inspired" by the runway. If you think about it, the basic models themselves are not what society normally accepts. They are either super thin, waify girls (who, in regular out-and-about lives, people would be concerned about) and then the trend of the "bigger" models who by normal society standards aren't big at all, just average-sized. Perhaps since it is high fashion people don't associate this makeup with black face times...or the people viewing these runway shows have no knowledge of blackface, which makes me stereotype of the type of people who attend runway shows.
ReplyDelete