Moda e Arte Fashion and art: unravelling a complex relationship*

Convegno Internazionale
Moda e Arte
Venerdì 9 maggio 2008 - ore 9.30
Aula Pio XI
Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore
Centro per lo Studio della Moda e della Produzione Culturale
L.go Gemelli 1 – 20123 Milano
Fashion and art: unravelling a complex relationship *
Abstract
Diana Crane, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia
craneher@sas.upenn.edu
Do not quote without the author’s permission.
Fashion design has many connections with the fine arts. I draw on three sets of
concepts and typologies from the sociology of art in order to interpret these
connections. First, I discuss whether it is appropriate to apply the concept of ‘art world’
(Becker, 1982) to the fashion system.
Second, I discuss whether a typology, which Becker (1982) developed in order to
distinguish between artists and craftspeople, provides a basis for distinguishing
between artists and fashion designers.
Third, I discuss the concept of “artification” (Shapiro, 2004a; 2004b) which refers to
the ways in which practitioners of cultural forms that are relatively uninstitutionalized
develop institutions that evaluate and regulate these forms of culture, thereby socially
constructing them as art forms. I argue that it is possible to observe this process in
fashion design as an occupation, although recent developments have tended to
threaten the autonomy of fashion designers whose control over the cultural and
economic capital embodied in their brand names is frequently threatened.
I conclude that fashion design can be differentiated from fine art on theoretical
grounds but I also call attention to the fact that contemporary art appears to be
undergoing a process of “deartification” in which financial goals are becoming
increasingly important.
* Paper prepared for the conference, “Fashion and Art”, Università Cattolica del Sacro
Cuore, Milan, May 9, 2008.
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Fashion design has many connections with the fine arts. Designers frequently draw
on motifs from the arts. Some designers emulate avant-gardes by creating shocking
or disturbing designs. Fashion museums and fashion exhibitions in art museums are no
longer anomalous. Artists themselves occasionally engage in fashion design. For
several centuries, fashionable clothing has contributed significantly to the art of
portraiture (Winkel, 2006). Fashion designers and journalists often declare that
designers are artists and that what they are doing is art.
PHOTO 1 - Elizabeth I
How can connections between fashion design and the fine arts be understood? Is it
possible to argue on the basis of cultural theory that designers are or are not artists?
I will draw on three sets of concepts and typologies from the sociology of art in
order to interpret these connections. First, I will discuss the familiar concept of ‘art
world’ (Becker, 1982). Is it correct to apply this concept to systems in which fashion
is produced? Second, I will discuss the typology which Becker (1982) developed in
order to distinguish between fine and applied arts, between artists and craftspeople.
Does this typology provide a basis for distinguishing between artists and fashion
designers? Third, I will discuss the concept of ‘artification’ (Shapiro, 2004; 2007)
which refers to the ways in which practitioners of cultural forms that are relatively
uninstitutionalized (such as hip hop, primitive art, the art of the insane) develop
institutions that evaluate and regulate these forms of culture, thereby socially
constructing them as art forms. Is it possible to observe this process in the field of
fashion design?
Both fashion design and fine art take place in several types of institutions in which
designers and artists perform different types of roles in different types of markets. In
both cases, I will restrict my attention to creators who are working at the most
prestigious levels of these occupations. In the case of fashion design, this comprises
designers engaged in haute couture and the luxury fashion industry in major fashion
cities (Paris, Milan, London, New York, and Tokyo). 1 In the case of fine art, this
comprises artists whose works are exhibited in prestigious art galleries and museums
in major art centers and sold in major auction markets.
1. Art Worlds and Fashion Systems
Becker (1982) defines art as a form of culture that is produced in a system of
collective activity, otherwise referred to as an art world. Art is defined as what
participants in a specific art world consider to be art. 2 Fashion is a generic term for
forms of culture that change frequently and that diffuse rapidly and widely. An
alternative definition is that fashions in clothing are what fashion designers and fashion
organizations produce.
Like art as conceptualised by Becker, fashion is a collective activity. In fashion
systems, organizations, institutions and individuals interact with one another to create,
legitimate, and disseminate a particular form of culture. Fashion has been described
as “the product of a chain of a great many individual decisions made by people
interconnected within the various niches in the industry” (Kawamura, 2005, p. 53; see
also Mora, 2006). These decisions contribute in different ways to the level of creativity
in the fashion product. A partial list of actors, in addition to designers, who are
involved in the production of ready-to-wear clothing includes: “assistant designers,
sample cutters, sample-makers, production pattern-makers and then factories that
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finalize the garments” 3 (Kawamura, 2005, p. 51). Cultural intermediaries who transmit
information from those engaged in the creative and production processes of fashion
design to consumers include photographers, journalists, fashion magazine editors,
models, agents, advertising agencies, distributors, shopkeepers, buyers for
department stores, salespersons, and fashion museum curators. Cultural
intermediaries shape the product, make it marketable, and locate ideas that can be
assimilated by the system. The fashion designer, like the artist, generally receives all
the credit for the cultural goods that are created in these systems.
However, fashion design (like other applied arts, such as architecture, interior
decoration, and furniture design) differs from fine art in that its system of collective
relationships constitutes an “aesthetic economy”. 4 In aesthetic economies, both
economic calculations and aesthetic issues are important aspects of cultural
production: “economic calculations are intertwined with cultural concerns and are
linked to cultural knowledge, capital, and acquired taste, and to social, cultural and
institutional relations” (Entwisle, 2002: 319). In the fine arts, economic considerations
tend to be minimal in the production of art although, once an art object exists, it may
or may not acquire economic value. In other words, the fine artist will create art works
whether or not they can be sold. The monetary value of art works fluctuates to such an
extent over time that Heinich (2001: 65) argues that monetary value is not a good
indicator of artistic value.
A major difference between fashion and fine art is the issue of utility, which, of
course, is an important aspect of the commercial value of fashion. The criterion of nonutility
is very important in art. Fashion designers create artifacts for customers that
are intended to be useful, even though the utility of certain types of dresses, such as
wedding gowns and ball gowns, is quite limited.
The difference between fashion and fine art can be seen by comparing the behavior
of artists who make art works using cloth with the behavior of fashion designers.
Using clothes and materials to make art works is sometimes called ‘clothes art’. Artists
who design clothes as works of art are not interested in the utilitarian or commercial
aspects of this activity.
PHOTO 2: Caroline Broadhead (1992) “wobbly dress”
The wobbly dress conforms to the artistic norm of not being useful. The dress is
made in such a way as to give the impression that it may once have been worn but it
cannot be worn. It is made from nylon panels, stitched in curving seams so that the
dress distorts itself as it is sewn. It seems to be moving as a result of the way it is
constructed.
PHOTO 3: Yayoi Kusama (1976): “Dress”
This dress by a Japanese artist is another example of a dress that is not intended
to be worn. Alternatively, some fashion designers have become artists and prefer to
exhibit works that are unique in galleries and museums instead of creating fashion
collections which consist of clothes that will usually be reproduced in varying quantities
according to market demand.
PHOTO 4: Lun’na menoh (164), 1998. Spring and summer collection
The fashion designer turned artist intends this work to evoke the ghosts of women
and past dresses which trace the evolution of the clothed female body.
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Perhaps the most famous example of an artist who engaged in fashion design is
that of the painter, Sonia Delaunay, who created designs that attracted a great deal of
attention in artistic circles in the early years of the twentieth century. Her approach to
fashion has been characterized as ‘anti-fashion’. She was not interested in the fashion
of her time. She was quoted as saying: “I wanted to escape fashion, to do something
absolutely new and modern. My starting point was the laws of color.” She created
clothes using her artistic principles of “simultaneism”, a style of painting based on
contrasts of color (Radu, 2004: 63). Her husband, who was also an artist, described
one of her dresses based on these principles as “a living painting…a sculpture of living
forms.” (p. 65) Later, she created a new category of clothes, ‘dress-poems,’ that
combined poetry and dress. During the nineteen-twenties, she had shops in Paris
where she sold her clothes to wealthy customers but establishing a business was not
her major concern.
PHOTO 5: Sonia Delaunay- Jacket and curtain (1924)
At the beginning of the 20 th century, several European artists decided to design
clothes because they disapproved of the fashions of the period (Radu, 2004) which
they considered to be ugly and unhealthy. However, the designs of these artists had
virtually no influence on commercial fashion because they were not familiar with the
fashion business and the process of producing clothes commercially.
Another indication of the difference between fashion design and fine art is that
fashion design is not generally perceived as art by art collectors, art dealers and
auction houses in art worlds. Although art magazines have occasionally covered avantgarde
fashion designers (Kim, 1998; Boodroo, 1990), there are enormous differences
in the values of art works and designer dresses in the contemporary auction market.
Auction prices of art works by leading contemporary artists in the late twentieth
century have recently reached 13.8 million euros or more (Sabbah, 2008). 5 For
example, in 2007, a painting by Andy Warhol was auctioned for 49.4 million euros
(Sabbah, 2008). Designer dresses are typically auctioned for less than 10,000 euros
(“Enchères haute couture”, 2004).
A major factor that influences the price of a designer garment is whether or not it
has been owned and worn by a celebrity. Two examples of this phenomenon have
occurred recently. In 1999, a dress made to order for Marilyn Monroe by an unknown
designer was auctioned for 1.78 million euros in 1999 (“Marilyn et ‘Mister President’”,
2007). In 2006, a dress designed by the French couturier, Givenchy, which Audrey
Hepburn wore in the film, Breakfast at Tiffanys, was auctioned at Christies in New
York for 467,000 British pounds (approx 681,000 euros) (Reier, 2007). In both cases,
these prices resulted from the significance of these dresses as film memorabilia and
not as exemplars of fashion design. A Hermès purse, named after the actress and
singer, Jane Birkin, was auctioned for 48,000 euros in 2005.
At one of the first auctions of clothes by French couturiers in Paris in 1992, the fact
that some of these clothes had belonged to well-known French actresses and singers
and to princesses in Europe and India added to their allure. The highest price (the
equivalent of approximately 29,000 euros today) went for a dinner coat designed by
Schiaparelli that had belonged to a French film actress (Benaïm, 1992; “La mode dans
l’art,” 1992).
The name of the designer sometimes affects the auction prices of clothes but only
a few prewar French designers generate high prices. A recent auction at Drouot in
Paris of clothes designed by Poiret and belonging to the Poiret family established new
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ecords for the sale of haute couture without celebrity validation: 130,000 euros for a
coat and almost 41,000 euros for a pair of evening shoes (Rich, 2005).
PHOTO 6 : Paul Poiret - Persian coat (1911)
At a recent auction of dresses designed by leading French designers after World
War II, the highest price was 25,500 euros, with most items going for less than 10,000
euros (“Enchères haute couture”, 2004).
To summarize, both fine art and fashion design are created in systems of
collaborative relationships. Fashion systems differ from art worlds in the relative
emphasis on economic considerations and on the utility of what is produced. Art
specialists in art worlds that assess the economic value of art works attribute
relatively little value to masterpieces of fashion design as indicated by the prices of
these objects at auction sales.
2. Artists vs. Craftsmen
Becker’s (1982) comparison of artists and craftsmen provides additional insights
for understanding the differences between fashion designers and artists. Becker
defines a craft as a combination of knowledge and skills for making objects that are
either useful or beautiful. He distinguishes between two types of crafts: crafts in which
craftsmen create useful objects in response to clients’ orders and crafts in which artistcraftsmen
create beautiful objects, again in response to clients’ demands.
By contrast, he views artists as not being dependent upon clients. Artists make
objects that are deliberately neither useful nor beautiful. For example, using the
materials of the potter, artists make teapots containing bricks and teapots with spouts
in the form of a penis. Each object made by an artist is unique. 6 Using Becker’s model,
one could argue that fashion designers working for haute couture and for luxury
fashion firms are analogous to artist-craftsmen, producing beautiful objects that are
intended to be part of a series. These designers create clothes that are beautiful but,
following to Becker, they do not qualify as art. A famous example from the past are
the clothes created by Vionnet who invented techniques of draping that are still widely
used today. Her clothes are considered “masterpieces of the art of dressmaking.”
(Milbank, 1985: 163). A collection created by the late twentieth century couturier,
Givenchy, was described in the press as “a manifesto of balance, clarity, rigor…Each
detail conformed to an absolute order of lines, of perfect diagonals” (Benaïm, 1995).
The annual prize awarded by the Chambre Syndicale de la Couture Parisienne from
1976 to 1991 was intended to designate the most beautiful collection of the season
(Kawamura, 2004: 44).
Designers working for fashion-oriented industrial companies and companies
producing low-priced clothing for mass markets are analogous to craftsmen, producing
useful garments in response to demand. For the most part, they are engaging in
imitation and adaptation rather than stylistic innovation.
However, Becker’s typology does not explain why some fashion designers
transgress stylistic norms of fashion design that prevail in a particular period. Becker
provides examples of artists “invading” crafts and creating art works that transgress
the craftsman’s norms concerning beauty and utility. It does not seem to occur to him
that craftsmen might transgress these norms as well. Becker’s perception of craft is
clearly that of an activity that is inferior to art. Today, rather than using the term,
craft, one would be more likely to refer to applied arts.
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It is possible to locate a number of strategies which fashion designers use to
transgress norms concerning beauty and utility in fashion design and to challenge the
traditional meanings and conventions of haute couture and luxury fashion design (see
handout):
1 Use of unconventional materials;
2 Transgression (violation of norms and conventions underlying couture
clothing and Western clothing in general);
3 Subversion (satirizing norms and conventions underlying couture clothing);
4 Surrealism (creating unexpected and unconventional associations between
different types of clothing or between clothing and other objects);
5 Pastiche (combining styles from different periods)
The first strategy is the use of materials that have not previously been considered
appropriate for luxurious clothing, such as metal and plastic (e.g. Paco Rabanne).
PHOTO 7: Paco Rabanne – Mini dress (1968)
This dress, which was made in 1968, is constructed of thin, flat pieces of gold
incrusted with diamonds above the bust and held together with gold rings. Rabanne
was deliberately being provocative and called his first collection in 1965: 12
unwearable dresses. Was he attempting to claim the status of an artist by emphasizing
that his clothes were not useful?
An entirely different approach to the use of materials was that of Martin Margiela
who, early in his career, challenged the notion that only expensive and beautiful
materials were suitable for luxury fashion design by using second hand clothes to
make his garments.
Another strategy, transgression, is to create clothes that challenge the basic
conventions underlying Western clothing, such as symmetry and perfection of
craftsmanship (e.g. Rei Kawakubo) (Sudjic, 1990). Traditionally, hems of dresses
have been symmetrical. Two decades after Kawakubo first presented unsymmetrical
hems this idea was finally widely adopted and could be seen everywhere on the streets
in Paris. Another taboo she challenged was that of the perfection of craftsmanship by
presenting clothes with holes or other imperfections. Along with other Japanese
designers, Yohji Yamamoto and Issy Miyake, she introduced radically new and
relatively formless shapes and proportions in fashionable clothing. Subsequently, other
European designers dispensed with the idea that clothes should fit perfectly, producing
trousers that were too small and buttons and buttonholes that did not align.
PHOTO 8: Rei Kawakubo – Dresses (1983)
PHOTO 9: Rei Kawakubo – ‘Lace’ sweater (1982)
In the 1930’s, Schiaparelli made a similar statement by presenting a dress
decorated with tears paired with a cape with real tears as a way of violating the norms
of haute couture (Martin, 1987).
PHOTO 10: Elsa Schiaparelli – Tear illusion dress and headscarf (1937)
A third strategy is subversion of aesthetic conventions, a strategy that has been
particularly identified in France with the work of Jean-Paul Gaultier (Delbourg-Delphis,
1983). Examples in his work include placing clothes traditionally used for a specific
purpose in another very different context (e.g. use of a corset as outerwear) or
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desacralizing major couture icons, like the Chanel suit jacket, by adding a toilet chain
as a belt.
PHOTO 11: Jean-Paul Gaultier – Hommage à Juliette Gréco (1980s)
In this dress, he redefines the character of a dress as a garment which traditionally
concealed a woman’s underwear. Here the hem of the dress is shortened to reveal a
garter and a garter belt.
A fourth strategy is incorporation of themes from surrealism, a major historical
example of the avant-garde. Decades after its heyday, surrealism remains an
important influence on many cultural forms, such as advertising and fashion
(Rawsthorn, 2007). Schiaparelli’s designs are important examples of the application of
surrealist principles to fashion (Martin, 1987). Surrealism provided an aesthetic
rationale which justified the attempt to alter the connotations of clothing and body
parts. The idea was to stimulate new perceptions of familiar objects. Schiaparelli
created a hat in the form of a shoe and a dress decorated with a lobster. At the same
time, Salvador Dali created a telephone in which the receiver was in the form of a
lobster claw.
PHOTO 12: Elsa Schiaparelli – ‘Lobster’ dress (1937)
A fifth strategy is pastiche, which can be described as the continual reshuffling of
fragments of preexisting texts from both the arts and popular culture. This
postmodernist approach is especially identified in France with the designs of John
Galliano (who works for Dior). An example is an outfit shown in one of his defilés in
which a hat, jacket and boots associated with seventeenth century musketeers are
associated with a mini skirt, a train, and a décolleté bustier worn by a voluptuous
female model (Crane, 2004).
PHOTO 13: John Galliano – Dress for a défilé (1992)
Does the use of stylistic devices associated with the avant-garde by fashion
designers mean that their works constitute the equivalent of an artistic avant-garde?
The answer to this question must take into consideration the intent of these objects
and the contexts in which they are displayed. Kawamura (2004: 130; see also Crane,
1987: 14) argues that three Japanese designers (Rei Kawakubo, Issy Miyake, and
Yohji Yamamoto) who have shown their collections in Paris since the nineteen-eighties
do indeed constitute an avant-garde on the grounds that: (1) their work redefined
aesthetic conventions; (2) it utilized new aesthetic tools and conventions, and (3) it
redefined the nature of the aesthetic object, including the range of objects that could
be considered aesthetic objects. Other designers who might qualify as an avant-garde
include a small group of British-trained designers working in Paris and elsewhere in the
nineteen-nineties, including Alexander McQueen and John Galliano (for a detailed
description of their work, see Evans, 2003).
Alternatively, one can argue that the collections of Japanese designers constituted
an aesthetic revolution in fashion but not in art. A major problem with applying the
concept of avant-garde to fashion designers is the commercial context in which their
work is framed. In general, arts institutions frame avant-garde messages in such a
way as to highlight their effect: an entire evening at the theater devoted to a particular
playwright, an entire gallery or museum wing devoted to the work of a particular artist
for several weeks. Many luxury fashion designers have attempted to frame their
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collections in such a way as to minimize the commercial context. They have created
stores that appropriate the appearance of art galleries, with white walls and floors and
a minimum of garments on display, but the fashion objects on display do not acquire
the same ‘aura’ as art objects, in part because they are not unique objects (see
Benjamin, 1969).
The most spectacular framing device for the designer is the fashion show which
has been compared to performance art. The collections of the British designers
constituted a major change in the way in which clothes were presented to buyers and
the press and in the contexts in which they were shown, which at times included train
stations, abandoned warehouses, etc. These designers were working for firms owned
by luxury conglomerates that allocated huge budgets to stage spectacular events.
Some of the clothes were designed to be unique ‘showpieces’ and were not intended to
be put into production. However, Evans (2003: 70) disputes the claim that these
shows were a form of performance art, stating: “The comparison of fashion with
performance art…fails to acknowledge the commercial reality of fashion shows. ..The
contemporary fashion show’s allegiance with art served, in reality, merely to enhance
its status and commercial value in an increasingly sophisticated market.”
Do these designers who have been labeled avant-garde perceive themselves as
artists? Throughout his career, Paco Rabanne concentrated on experimenting with new
materials, such as plastic and metal, in his collections and had no interest in the
commercial side of his business. His company’s profits were primarily derived from
perfumes. His dedication to innovation for its own sake is unusual for a fashion
designer and, as such, his outlook is closer to that of an artist than most other
contemporary designers, as indicated by the following description of his work
(McDowell, 1987: 226): “His knowledge of architecture and his interest in sculpture are
evident in his approach to fashion…It is arguable that he has moved into a selfindulgent
‘dead end’, since much of the excitement of his clothes cannot be capitalized
on in practical terms….His work is in many museums, but whether it should be shown
under ‘sculpture’, ‘industrial design’, or ‘fashion’ is arguable.”
Rei Kawakubo has denied that she is an artist (Kawamura, 2004: 141). Her
biographer (Sudjic, 1990: 11) states: “Nor do (her) clothes belong to the rarefied
world of art for art’s sake: a shrewd business intelligence guides their
production…economic success is an essential part of maintaining her creative
independence.”
At the beginning of his career, Issy Miyake advocated an approach to clothing as
visual culture rather than as utilitarian artifacts (Holborn, 1995: 22). His intention was
to stimulate the imagination through clothing. During his long career, his work has
been exhibited in many museums but his design has involved not only dramatic
experiments with fabrics, one of which appeared on the cover of Artforum, but an
increasing concern with practicality and “clothes for real life” (p. 50). He views design
as teamwork; his career has involved constant collaboration (p. 78, 104).
John Galliano, who produces exceptionally creative fashion shows, recently stated
(Jones and Rushton, 2006: 68): “I am here to make people dream, to seduce them
and to make them want to buy beautiful clothes, but also to force myself to create
dazzling styles. That is my duty.”
Ironically, French couturiers at the beginning of the twentieth century who were
actually artist-craftsmen did consider themselves as artists (see below) (Lipovetsky,
1987). Today, the goal of designers who transgress the norms of fashion design is not
to acquire the status of artists but to access a form of symbolic capital that improves
their status as fashion designers. As such, their avant-garde creations often attract a
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great deal of attention in the media and sometimes influence subsequent
developments in fashion.
3. Fashion and Artification
Artification has been defined as “a process of transformation of ‘non-art’ into art”
(Shapiro, 2007) that increases the prestige of a cultural form. Shapiro suggests that
this process is often controversial; it may be resisted by some actors and is likely to be
perceived in different ways by different groups of participants.
Artification takes place as a result of a variety of activities that increase the
visibility of a cultural form. These activities include: (1) changes in the types of actors
who engage in the activity, specifically, their level of education, social status, artistic
knowledge and interests, level of cultural sophistication, and level of autonomy in their
relationships with the public; (2) changes in the characteristics of the cultural artifacts
themselves that enhance their associations with the arts; (3) creation of organizations
that promote the cultural activity in various ways, such as schools, museums, galleries,
foundations, and trade organizations, as well as programs within organizations that
enhance the value of the cultural activity; and (4) changes in perception of the cultural
form on the part of cultural and governmental organizations, specifically, classification
of the activity as a form of cultural heritage that is worthy of protection in museums
and galleries and of financial support in the form of grants and other types of aid from
government agencies and foundations;
Beginning in the middle of the nineteenth century, French couturiers developed
tactics that increased their status and prestige. Charles Frederick Worth, an
Englishman who set up a fashion business in Paris at that time, reversed the traditional
structural relationship between client and designer by dictating to his clients what
designs they should wear rather than following their orders in the tradition role of an
artisan (Lipovetsky, 1987, p. 92). Later, he was instrumental in the creation of the first
trade organization for fashion designers that greatly increased their power and
privileges. Leading designers claimed the status of artists. Their designs carried their
names and were protected by copyright. According to Lipovetsky (p. 96), couturiers
“presented themselves as ‘artists of luxury’ who collected works of art, lived in
sumptuous and refined settings, surrounded themselves with poets and painters, and
created costumes for the theater. During the twentieth century, the social status of
couturiers entering the occupation steadily increased (Crane, 2004).
A variation of this strategy is one in which the fashion designer assumes the role of
art donor, creating and directing an art museum or an art gallery rather than a
fashion museum. In Milan, Miuccia Prada has created an art foundation which has
sponsored and exhibited the work of numerous contemporary artists, both emerging
and established (Kimmelman, 2008). A full-fledged museum and cultural center,
designed by the eminent architect, Rem Koolhaas, will be finished in three or four
years. Although one of her artist-protégés claims that “she’s never trying to play the
artist”, these activities have “reinforced her status as a highbrow designer”
(Kimmelman, 2008). The French designer, Agnès B., has owned an art gallery in Paris
since the early1990s.
Another type of artification can be observed in strategies that are sometimes used
by fashion designers to increase the value attached to specific fashion objects. These
strategies include collaboration with artists and the use of limited editions in which
each piece is numbered. Probably the most famous case of a fashion designer
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collaborating with artists was the collaboration between Schiaparelli and surrealist
artists, such as Dali, Man Ray and Jean Cocteau, in the 1930s. 7
PHOTO 14 Elsa Schiaparelli and Jean Cocteau: Embroidered evening coat (1937)
A case of the use of both these techniques occurred in Paris in 2007 in a small,
family-owned firm. Tara Jarmon, the designer, collaborated with an abstract painter,
Peter Zimmermann (Lorelle, 2007). Their collaboration was announced very
prominently in the windows of Tara Jarmon stores. Using his own canvasses,
Zimmermann created abstract designs for material that was used to make six styles of
dresses. Like art works, each of the dresses was given a name by the artist (Pop,
Plouf, Aqua, Pshitt, etc.). The mini-collection was described as “prêt-art-porter”. The
dresses in each of the styles were numbered from one to one hundred and fifty and
sold exceptionally well.
Another recent example of this phenomenon was the production and sale of a
series of twenty designs on rectangular pieces of silk. Each piece of silk was numbered
and printed with a design by a leading designer and with the designer’s signature. The
prototype designs were framed and hung on a wall in a leading Paris department store.
A third type of artification has increased the value and visibility of fashion as a
cultural form through the existence of schools dedicated to teaching fashion design and
related subjects and of programs devoted to fashion studies in universities and art
schools and through the proliferation of fashion museums. Fashion museums or
sections dedicated to fashion in art museums are becoming more widespread
(Anderson, 2000; Steele, 2008). 8 Fashion museums mimic the strategies of art
museums, holding retrospectives of the work of important designers and acquiring
permanent collections. Ironically, fashion is most likely to be treated as an art form
when it is not longer “in fashion”.
Recognition of the importance of fashion by other types of cultural organizations
suggests that its value as a form of cultural heritage is being recognized. For example,
art museums have begun to exhibit the work of fashion designers and the auction
market now auctions designer clothes. In France, fashion entered the auction market
only about twenty years ago in 1987 (Benaïm, 1992). The major buyers appear to be
fashion museums, private collectors, couture houses (which buy back their own
creations), and occasionally the French government on behalf of a fashion museum.
However, the process of artification remains incomplete. Fashion museums differ in
important ways from art museums. Menkes (2007b) claims that fashion exhibitions
and fashion museums can easily become “vanity productions, self-sponsored, and selfselected”.
Toward the end of their careers, a few successful fashion designers have
recently created museums to preserve their work. For example, Armani is doing this in
Milan and Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Cardin have done so in Paris (Menkes, 2007a).
A major difference between fashion exhibitions and museums and art exhibitions and
museums is the susceptibility of the former to pressure from powerful fashion
organizations. Exhibitions in fashion museums have often been perceived as marketing
tools by fashion companies particularly if they are celebrations of the work of living
designers who benefit from the publicity (Steele, 2008). When art museums have
exhibited the works of fashion designers, curators of these exhibitions have been
accused of “selling out”, as was the case of the Armani exhibition at the Guggenheim
Museum (Menkes, 2007b) and the Yves Saint Laurent show at the Metropolitan
Museum (Anderson, 2000), both in New York. The difficulties that fashion exhibitions
have faced in acquiring credibility suggest that fashion has only partially achieved the
status of cultural heritage.
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During the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, designers increased their
prestige and autonomy in conducting their businesses and in their relationships with
clients. Today, however, the fashion industry has been transformed into a major part
of the luxury goods industry. The global market for luxury goods is worth 180 billion
dollars and is growing at a rate of 5% to 7% per year (Ducourtieux, 2006b). In
Europe, this industry is centered in France and Italy and is dominated by two large
French conglomerates: LVMH (Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy) and PPR (Pinault-
Printemps-Redoute). These conglomerates own companies belonging to many of the
leading designers in France, Italy, England and, to a lesser extent, in the U.S.
Unlike designer companies in the past, which were run by the designer and a close
associate who exercised complete control over their companies, luxury conglomerates
are run by business managers who have often had little experience in the fashion
business. The current president of the Gucci group, a major luxury conglomerate, was
formerly head of a division of Unilever, an American company that makes ice cream
and frozen food products (Ducourtieux, 2006b). Fashion companies owned by these
conglomerates are sold if they are not profitable.
A major aspect of the activities of the conglomerates is the concept of the brand
through which “marketers and advertisers attach images to goods” (Lash and Urry,
1994, p. 15). Brands are developed through advertising, marketing, product
placements, staged events, and other strategies (Arvidsson, 2005, p. 239). The
primary goal of a luxury conglomerate is to develop and maintain a successful brand
that can be used to sell many different types of products, including clothing.
Managements evaluate the work of their designers in relation to the success of their
brands (Hume, 2007). One manager has been quoted as saying: “everything does not
depend on the stylist’s pencil: the real boss is the brand.” The manager of Dior has
made it very clear that John Galliano, considered one of the most creative of
contemporary designers, is not free to create whatever he likes. He says: “We provide
him with marketing information, we decide how the brand will be positioned, and John
is briefed on what direction to take.”(Hume, 2007).
While organizations, such as La Chambre Syndicale de la Couture Parisienne, still
control entry into the highest ranks of the occupation (Kawamura, 2004), successful
designers increasingly make their reputations by working for firms owned by luxury
conglomerates but their positions in these organizations tend to be very precarious. 9
At the beginning of the twenty-first century, there was a long list of important and
influential fashion designers who were unemployed, because they had been fired by
the luxury conglomerates that owned their firms (Horyn, 2006).
Unlike artists whose works of art are protected by copyright and whose relationship
to each work is attested by her signature, designers’ cultural and economic capital is
embodied in their brands rather than in the fashion objects they create. If a designer is
obliged to sell her firm, she risks losing control over the use of her brand name. The
possibility of asserting a designer’s right to copyright her designs has been virtually
eliminated because of the highly mediatised environment in which designers’
collections are shown. Images are relayed globally on the Internet as soon as they
appear and copied almost immediately by fast fashion distributors in Europe and mass
market producers in Asia. 10 Counterfeiting of luxury goods is rampant, in part because
luxury goods are not unique objects but are produced in substantial quantities
(Ducourtieux, 2006a).
All of these factors are reducing the autonomy of the fashion designer and
consequently his or her potential to engage in stylistic innovation. Today, it is very
difficult for a new designer to succeed in France without being associated with one of
the luxury conglomerates. Globalization gives an advantage to large firms that have
11

ample funds to invest in stores and distribution systems in all the major world markets
and to pay for elaborate fashion shows and advertisements to display designer
products. 11
Consequently, there is a contradiction between the status of fashion in previous
eras which is approaching that of cultural heritage and the status of contemporary
fashion which has become an instrument for profit in the luxury goods industry. The
luxury goods industry at times attempts to present its products as a form of cultural
heritage that embodies the values of past elites and of superb workmanship, but it
does not provide ideal conditions for the creation of new forms of cultural heritage.
The relationship between fashion design and the fine arts varies in fashion systems
in different countries, depending on the cultural and social context in a specific city or
country and on the level of cultural and economic resources available for investment in
this type of culture. My discussion has been primarily based on the French fashion
system but major fashion systems also exist in Italy, Britain, the U.S., and Japan. 12
In France, the connections between fashion and art have been emphasized by the
fashion establishment while in Britain, the opposite has been the case. Until the 1960s,
fashion designers in Britain were considered artisans rather than artists. The clienteles
of elite designers were composed of royalty and other members of the upper class
whose conservative tastes inhibited the aesthetic aspects of fashion design. Since the
late sixties, young fashion designers from working class backgrounds have been
trained in art schools where they participate in urban working class subcultures and
produce subversive designs but their activities continue to be marginal in relation to
the British clothing industry. The most talented British designers tend to be employed
on the continent. In Italy, ideals of elegance and beauty are widely shared among
different social classes. Italians are the largest consumers of clothing products in the
European Union. The Italian fashion system performs an important role, both
economically and symbolically in Italian culture but haute couture firms have never
been as prestigious or as influential as comparable firms in France (Crane and Bovone,
2006: 329; see also Reinach, 2006). Japan’s fashion system developed later than the
fashion systems in Paris, Milan, and London. Its most famous designers have recently
challenged the tenets of Western fashion but Japanese designers are less revered by
the Japanese fashion consumer than French and Italian luxury designers who represent
their ideal of high fashion (Kawamura, 2006). Finally, in the United States, the few
designers who have attempted to produce ‘couture’ and to assume the role of artist
have a small, very elite public whose tastes are very different from the majority of the
public that favors casual styles appropriate for different life styles (Crane, 2004).
To summarize, the nature and importance of the connections between fashion
design and fine arts varies in different countries but attempts to use connections
between fashion design and the fine arts to enhance the prestige of fashion objects
occur in most fashion systems.
4. Fashion, Art and Artification: An Alternative Model
Most forms of commercial culture and applied art contain subcultures or niches
that roughly correspond to Becker’s typology of useful crafts and beautiful crafts. In
addition they often include a category that he attributes to artists rather than
craftsmen, that of using strategies associated with artistic avant-gardes to create
objects from materials associated with specific crafts (see, for example, the discussion
of video games by Sandor and Fron, 2001).
12

However, Becker’s definitions need to be reformulated. In other words, subcultures
that correspond to his term, ‘useful crafts’, are those in which the products are
formulaic and relatively uniform or outright imitations of other works. I call this group
‘utilitarian actors’. These products are directed toward the least sophisticated
audiences. Rather than being beautiful, they are likely to be kitsch.
Subcultures, which correspond to what Becker calls the work of “artist-craftsmen”,
produce items that are beautiful and less formulaic but not aesthetically challenging.
They are directed toward more sophisticated audiences with higher purchasing power.
I call this group ‘aesthetic actors’.
Subcultures which draw on strategies associated with artistic avant-gardes produce
works that are neither formulaic nor beautiful; their usefulness is limited. They are
aesthetically challenging, but tend to have small markets. 13 I call this group ‘avantgarde
actors’. It may include actors from the arts as well as from the applied arts.
Avant-garde actors from the applied arts are different from avant-garde actors from
the fine arts because their motives are ultimately commercial.
The following table (see handout) summarizes these ideas:
Table 1: Orientations toward the arts and artification in applied arts
Avant-garde and
Goals: postmodernist actors Aesthetic actors Utilitarian actors
Innovation High Low Low
Beauty Low High Low
Utility Low Low High
5. Is Art Becoming Less like Art?
The problems associated with the artification of fashion as a cultural activity need
to be interpreted in the context of changes that are taking place in the art world. Fine
art itself is changing in ways that necessitate new conceptions of artistic activity.
These changes include the decline of the avant-garde and the rise of postmodernism
and the increasing influence of wealthy collectors without commitments to specific art
styles. Conceptual art, which has dominated the art world for the past twenty years,
concentrates upon exploring the limits of art itself (Galenson, 2001).
Bauman (1997: 95), a British sociologist, argues that while there is a great deal of
change in contemporary arts, these changes are “random, dispersed, and devoid of
clear-cut direction.” He claims that “the importance of an artwork is determined less by
aesthetic elements than by publicity and the notoriety that results from it.” Exhibitions
of provocative and sensational art works generate a great deal of publicity but do not
represent genuine avant-garde movements.
As a result of the influence of postmodernism, many artists move from one
medium to another without being concerned about whether their activities are
associated with arts institutions or with commercial culture. Contemporary artists
increasingly blur the boundaries between art, fashion, design, architecture, television,
and other visual media (Marsh, 2006). Outside the art world, the visual strategies and
tactics of artistic avant-gardes have been widely adopted in the electronic media, such
as television and music videos and in applied arts, such as fashion and furniture design
(Rawsthorn, 2007), although, as I have argued above, the ideological implications of
the avant garde are generally diminished outside the fine arts.
13

These changes raise the question of whether we are witnessing a partial artification
of fashion and other forms of applied art and commercial culture and, at the same
time, a “deartification” of the fine arts in that artists are becoming increasingly
susceptible to commercial incentives. Jeff Koons, one of whose paintings recently sold
at auction for the highest price ever achieved by a living artist (16.25 million euros),
supervises a staff of eighty people who produce his art works, often in several copies
(Tomkins, 2007; Melikian, 2007). He does not create art works himself. His favorite
themes are drawn from various forms of commercial culture,
One of the most important American artists of the nineteen-sixties and seventies,
Jasper Johns, recently commented (Vogel, 2008): “It’s a different art world from the
one I grew up in. Artists…are more aware of the market than they once were. There
seems to be something in the air that art is commerce itself.”
PHOTO 15: Koons: ‘Triple Elvis’
Conclusion
The question that I have examined in this paper is whether it is possible to
distinguish between fashion design and fine art on the basis of sociological theory,
rather than on the basis of purely aesthetic criteria. I have used sociological concepts,
such as art world, fashion system, and artification, and a typology of differences
between different types of crafts to show that fashion design can in fact be
differentiated from fine art on theoretical grounds.
14

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AVANT-GARDE STRATEGIES IN FASHION
1 Use of unconventional materials;
2 Transgression:
Violation of norms and conventions underlying couture clothing and
Western clothing in general;
3 Subversion:
Satirizing norms and conventions underlying couture clothing;
4 Surrealism:
Creating unexpected and unconventional associations between different
types of clothing or between clothing and other objects;
5 Pastiche:
Combining styles from different periods.
ORIENTATIONS TOWARD THE ARTS AND ARTIFICATION
IN APPLIED ARTS
Avant-garde and
Goals: Postmodernist actors Aesthetic actors Utilitarian actors
Innovation High Low Low
Beauty Low High Low
Utility Low Low High
PICTURES
1 ARTIST: Portrait of Elizabeth I
2 ARTIST: Caroline Broadhead- Wobbly dress, 1992
3 ARTIST: Yayoi Kusama – Dress, 1976
4 FASHION DESIGNER-ARTIST: Lun’na Menoh – Spring and Summer Collection,
1998
5 ARTIST-FASHION DESIGNER: Sonia Delaunay, Jacket and curtain, 1924
6 FASHION DESIGNER: Paul Poiret - Persian coat, 1911
7 FASHION DESIGNER: Paco Rabanne – Mini dress, 1968
8 FASHION DESIGNER: Rei Kawakubo – Dresses, 1983
9 FASHION DESIGNER: Rei Kawakubo - ‘Lace’ sweater, 1982
10 FASHION DESIGNER: Elsa Schiaparelli- Tear illusion dress and headscarf, 1937
11 FASHION DESIGNER: Jean-Paul Gaultier - Hommage à Juliette Gréco, 1980’s
12 FASHION DESIGNER: Elsa Schiaparelli- ‘Lobster’ dress, 1937
13 FASHION DESIGNER: John Galliano - Dress for a défilé, 1992
14 14. FASHION DESIGNER AND ARTIST: Elsa Schiaparelli-Jean Cocteau -
Embroidered evening coat, 1937
15 ARTIST: Jeff Koons - Triple Elvis, 2007
* I am grateful for the comments of Roberta Shapiro and Julie Thomas on an earlier draft of this paper.
19

1 Other levels of the fashion industry include fashion-oriented brands, such as Gap and Benetton, fashionoriented
distribution firms, such as H&M and Zara, and mass market industrial fashion.
2 Becker (1982: 34) states that “art worlds consist of all the people whose activities are necessary to the
production of the characteristic works which that world, and perhaps others as well, define as art.”
3 In addition, the production of a dress that is made to order in the atelier of an haute couture designer also
requires the participation of milliners, glove-makers, feather-makers, embroiderers, lace-makers, pleatmakers,
shoemakers and jewelry-makers (Kawamura, 2005, p. 53).
4 Elizabeth Wilson in her classic book on fashion, Adorned in Dreams (1985), takes a different position. She
says that fashion is a form of visual art (p. 9). She states (p. 60): “Related…to both fine and popular art, it is
a kind of performance art…a kind of hinge between the elitist and the popular.” Her discussion concerns
fashion in general and does not distinguish between different types of fashion that might have different
types of relationships with the arts.
5 In 2007, paintings by four contemporary (post-World War II) artists (Francis Bacon, Jeff Koons, Andy
Warhol, and Mark Rothko) were auctioned for sums ranging from 16,200,000 euros to 50,207,000 euros.
Most of the prices quoted in this paper were originally given in dollars; I have presented the equivalent
prices in euros.
6 Fashion designers occasionally create items of clothing for their seasonal fashion shows that are never
commercialized. However, these items contribute to the commercial success of the company by attracting
publicity and media coverage.
7 This strategy is often used by artists when they make lithographs and photographers when they sell prints.
8 A few museums specialize in fashion. Some costume museums have important collections of fashion items.
France has several museums or quasi-museums devoted to fashion (Musée de la Mode et du Costume
located in the Palais Galliera, Musée de la Mode et du Textile located in the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Musée
de la Mode de Marseilles, Musée Passé-Présent-Futur Pierre Cardin, and the Fondation Pierre Bergé Yves
Saint-Laurent). In England, the Victoria and Albert Museum which is devoted to the decorative arts includes
a fashion collection. Other venues include the Judith Clark Costume Gallery and Zandra Rhodes’ Design
Museum. Other European fashion museums are located in Antwerp, Hasselt, Madrid, Munich, and Vienna. In
New York, the Metropolitan Museum houses the Costume Institute which sponsors exhibitions of fashion and
has a collection of designer clothing. The fashion museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology is also
located in New York. Fashion and costume museums in Japan include the Kyoto Costume Institute and the
Kobe Fashion Museum, Fashion museums also exist in South Korea, Singapore, and Hong Kong.
9 The clientele for French haute couture (dresses made to order for the client) has steadily declined and
constitutes today no more than a few hundred women in the entire world. These extremely expensive
clothes are made with expensive materials and require hundreds of hours of skilled workmanship. Only
about a dozen fashion houses still engage in this type of activity. All haute couture houses have lines of
ready-to-wear clothing that are simpler to make and less expensive. Other luxury designers produce only
ready-to-wear clothing.
10 A rare example of a counterfeit case occurred in 1994 when Yves Saint Laurent sued Ralph Lauren in Paris
for copying one of Yves Saint Laurent’s designs. Ralph Lauren’s European branch lost the case and paid a
sizable fine (Kawamura, 2004: 50).
11 Suzy Menkes (2006) stated in a recent article in the New York Times: “The current state of the fashion
industry and a cultural state of mind makes it virtually impossible for any new designer to brand-build in the
way that the 1980s seedlings flowered into mighty trees.”
12 In the 1980s and 1990s, many new fashion centers emerged, such as Amsterdam, Antwerp, Barcelona,
Berlin, Buenos Aires, Dubai, Dusseldorf, Hong Kong, Los Angeles, Moscow, Mumbai, Singapore, and São
Paolo (Janssen, 2006: 388).
13 Issey Miyake made a similar point when he acknowledged, after a very successful museum exhibition of
his work, that he had “big audiences to look, but small audiences to wear” (Holborn, 1995: 78).
20