Stunning time-lapse video of the Earth from the International Space Station, set to Howard Blake’s memorable Walking in the Air from the children’s classic, The Snowman. Very clever use of the song by NASA, demonstrating they still have some people who know what it takes to engage the public. No more words are necessary, just enjoy the beautifully crisp images and see if you can spot your home… 
Men's Golfing Clothes in 1901, from the Sartorial Arts Journal, image via Wikipedia
Men’s dress has sunk into a rut of ugliness and unhealthiness from which… it should be rescued. [One of our] aims is the encouragement of a somewhat greater range of individual style than is possible with men’s present very stereotyped costumes.
That excerpt is from the early literature of the Men’s Dress Reform Party (MDRP), founded in 1929. Although the MDRP faded into obscurity by the outbreak of World War II, I think it is no exaggeration to say that it achieved its means – if not its ultimate aims – in our modern society.
Menswear in 1929 was very different from today: many variations existed to account for different seasonalities & settings, and clothes were generally tailored & structured. Today, most men wear similar-looking clothes under most circumstances, with the merest nods to season and occasion.
I would suggest that – contrary to the MDRP’s hopes – this has not resulted in a general increase in individual expression of style nor in an increase in beauty. The simpler, less tailored clothes of recent decades have instead encouraged most men to expend less effort on their appearance. Instead of adopting an individual style, they simply dress in a different (and less aesthetically-pleasing) stereotyped costume.
It is theoretically possible to achieve a handsome look in both tailored and less structured garments. It requires an active, self-editing and insightful approach to wardrobe selection. The uniformity and similarity of much modern mens clothes makes the pursuit of such individual style more esoteric: it requires a deliberate effort by those men wishing to pursue it.
Such men generally fall into two camps: those following fashion and those trying to rediscover elements of older tailoring traditions. Neither path is immutable: fashion follows the aesthetic vision of a house’s designer, and older traditions grew out of similar aesthetic choices made people in the past. The latter has the benefit of being a visual language familiar to a large mass of the general public whereas fashion constantly tries to create (reinvent?) a new visual language which naturally will have fewer speakers at any moment in time. But both systems can give those who want to craft a distinctive & personal visual identity the tools to do so.
As a monthly style publication of the era said of the MDRP’s goals:
Comfort and hygiene are very desirable, but that doesn’t make such things as style and dignity, and custom and suitability, any less important.
It is easy to obtain clean and comfortable clothing today, in a way that the man of 1929 would find astonishing. But the challenge for the man of today who wants to dress well has not changed: it is to select clothing that is attractive and stylish. And to be able to select wisely requires that the man bothers to learn the visual language of clothes in the first place.
For those wanting to know more about the history of the MDRP, a good summary of the its nature, members and political motivations (which included strands of Public Health Policy, Socialism, Class Conflicts and Eugenics) can be found in the relevant chapter by Barbara Burman in The Men’s Fashion Reader, edited by Peter McNeil and Vicki Karaminas.
From Masks to Helmets; specifically the Corinthian, Illyrian and Arcadian/Laconian types pictured from left to right in this photograph taken in the Benaki Museum, Athens. Helmets are of course primarily defensive pieces of armour, but their decoration reveals their auxiliary function identifying friend from foe on the battlefield. Massed ranks of soldiers uniformly attired also have a psychological effect, inspiring what modern tacticians might call “shock and awe” in the opposition, and boosting courage in the wearer.
A uniform also lends an identity to the wearer, sometimes the most important identity a person possesses if they are young and as yet unformed. This graveyard stele (right), photographed in the National Archaeology Museum in Athens, depicts the tomb’s inhabitant, an Athenian soldier.
The accompanying inscription tells the reader that the man died young, in service, and without a family of his own. Wearing his uniform in perpetuam on the stele gives his death some deeper meaning, a tradition we continue to this day with flags, poppies and other symbols of military Remembrance.
Society is generally good at creating roles for its constituent members. Regardless of what sociopolitical system is in place, their continued operation depends on the consent of the population being governed. The Greeks recognised four main systems: tyranny, oligarchy, timocracy and democracy, but were more open-minded than we tend to be today about which system is “best” for the population, and about what metric is optimally suited to define “best”. Regardless, even the most tyrannical regime depends of the consent of a critical mass of its population to survive. Without this, revolution ensues, as the populations of several Arab countries would attest to this year.
People generally like being assigned a role by society, even if the role is to be an angry outsider. It gives them the luxury of a pre-fabricated identity, and saves them the effort to trying to create an identity of their own. Society also benefits, because most people given a social identity tend to be quite predictable in their actions and will reinforce the status quo of the polity governing them. Deciding on one’s own identity/meaning – the process of psychological integration Jung called individuation – is a never-ending process with uncertain outcome.
Nonetheless, it does offer the prospect of defining a more profound and personal meaning. This votive relief (below) depicts an athlete crowning himself with a wreath; the holes show where a metal wreath was attached. It is an appropriate image to end this post with; the ultimate symbolic seizing of one’s own destiny.
Ancient fertility images routinely depict the pregnant female. This Greek Neolithic gold pendant can be interpreted as a schematic symbolic representation of this form, with the two protuberances at the top of the circular “belly” forming breasts. Adjacent to it in the National Archaeology Museum in Athens are these more obviously symbolic pendants:
It is not surprising to discover phallic and ktenic symbolism in ancient jewellery, when the creation of new life was viewed as a miraculous divine event. What is more amusing to note is that these Neolithic trinkets set the pattern for human jewellery down the ages. The simplified female form of the pendant in the first image became the necklace and the ring, and the phallic central pendant of the second image remains with us in earrings.
Of course, we have attached new symbolic meanings to these items. When a new culture subsumes an older one, it assimilates it, grafting sanitised new meanings to any older habits/traditions that are too deeply ingrained to expunge. Thus, the ring becomes a symbol of eternal union, rather than the fertility symbol of old. More controversially, phallic pendants become religious keepsakes, such as crucifixes.
Since Freud, psychiatrists are often said to see sexual symbols where there are none. These Neolithic items suggest that it is the wider population that has stopped seeing phallic-ktenic imagery where it previously existed. Thousands of years of cultural development have overlaid new meanings and more complex symbolism onto older, simpler forms. But the forms remain and therefore at some deeper level, so do the original meanings.
Think of that next time you pop on a ring, or a pair of earrings. And don’t get me started on the symbolism of piercings…
What do you see in the above image?
If you’re anything like me, your first thought is “ritual cultic mask”.
In fact, it is thought more likely to be protective headgear worn during metal-working in Bronze Age Greece. The mask is one of many I saw displayed on a recent visit to the National Archaeological Museum in Athens. It is interesting that my preconceptions/mental associations of Ancient Greece as a powerful mystical cultural source led to my assuming the mask had an equally mystical role. It’s amusing to see one’s own assumptions turned on their head; it encourages further thought.
Masks are commonly thought of as means of disguise; a way to conceal identity from detection. But in fact, they can also be used to create identity. Think of the masks used in Greek theatre or Japanese Kabuki, both designed to evoke the spirit of a character and so allow the observer to know how to react to their stage antics. Think also of Venetian carnival masks, used in a more permissory manner to give the wearer freedom from their normal responsibilities; a license to be licentious.
Masks are also commonly used in funerary rites, especially in earlier eras (though the art of the modern mortician could be thought of as continuing this ritual remaking of the dead). The Mycenean golden death mask below is also from the Athenian National Archaeological Museum, and has the rare feature of depicting the dead person with eyes open:
The death mask illustrates another role of masks: to transform the person wearing the mask into something else. The image below from the Benaki Museum in Athens is not a mask (it’s a garment buckle) but my reflection in the cabinet’s glass while taking the photo neatly replaces my own face by the Gorgon’s face (you can just about see my shirt collar below). Another masked transformation of sorts…
Masks can therefore be co-opted as disguises, as emotional guides, and as transforming agents. And of course, they are deployed in a metaphorical way during our daily lives, as we mould our words and actions to suit different circumstances, sometimes suppressing our inner thoughts to do so.
On that note, I will end by quoting American author Clifton Fadiman on the risks of our using self-created masks too often:
For most men life is a search for the proper manila envelope in which to get themselves filed.
Edvard Munch, Vampire (1893/84). Munch originally named the painting Love and Pain and it is not meant to be vampiric in theme; the lady is not a vampire but a lover. Its subsequent worldwide fame under the name Vampire is an intriguing example of the artist's expressionist message being re-interpreted by the viewer.
Expressionism and Minimalism are probably vaguely familiar terms to you. At their respective cores, Expressionist artists translate their subjective experience of reality into their work, so giving the viewer a glimpse of their internal experience; whereas Minimalism is reductionist, paring down meaning into its simplest components, rendering it more meaningful to the viewer. It could therefore be said that Expressionism is indulgent to the artist, as it is their personal perspective that matters the most, whereas Minimalism is over-generous to the viewer by stripping a message down to its bullet points.
There is a paradox here. The Expressionist artist, in his attempt to convey a holistic sense of subjective experience, may convey more to the viewer than the Minimalist, who with his more stark approach, overtly sets the agenda and the parameters of communication. The Expressionist may thus end up enabling the viewer more, in terms of permitting said viewer his own interpretation of the work. The Minimalist may end up narrowing the scope of meaning so intensively that the viewer has no choice but to interpret it in a particular way. We therefore see that – as with so many other situations in life – the intent of the creator may be at odds with the effect of his creation. It is a wise artist who is aware of this.
These terms are also used in other settings, especially Minimalism. The concept gained significant traction with the general public in the fields of architecture and interior design, to the extent that Minimalist designs are perceived as modern, clean, professional and efficient. This reflects the narrowness of the communication bandwidth used in Minimalism, and the clear intent of the designer to ensure form and function co-ordinate elegantly.
The terms are less commonly applied to clothes, but the parallel is quite obvious. A Minimalist approach to dressing encourages communication on the dresser’s terms, by setting a narrow agenda. It gives little leeway to the observer to perceive an alternative interpretation. To use an example many readers may be familiar with, Don Draper (the central character of TV show Mad Men) adopts a certain business look common in the 1960s. Unconsciously, viewers will regard him a certain way.
A different, but equally precise, dressing archetype would be Gordon Gekko (Wall Street). The moviegoer translates that look into the clichéd and largely meaningless term, “power dressing”. Note that while the message in both Draper’s and Gekko’s cases is resolutely Minimalist, the elements that compose it are not the same. In Draper’s case, the elements themselves are also Minimalist: mainly solid suits, narrow dark ties, white shirts, folded white pocket square. In Gekko’s, the elements are almost the opposite; flamboyant suits, braces, silk puffed pocket squares, boldly striped shirts. But the message in each case is remarkably similar, and equally pared down.
Another example of a clear & focused minimal message is Richard Gere’s Armani-draped American Gigolo. His character demonstrates that minimalism of message does not require harsh clean lines. His clothes at the start of the movie are soft in appearance but the message they exude is precise and unambiguous: sexual availability. As the movie progresses, his clothing becomes ragged, symbolising his increasing distress and loss of control. They no longer send out a message of his choice, but reveal his state of mind. In effect, they transition from Minimalist to Expressionist.
Costume designers are generally expert in a minimalist approach to dressing. Their very job requires them to distill a character down to core traits and find a way of conveying precisely those traits and nothing else that would distract or confuse an audience. While the elements they choose may vary from the clean & tidy to the gaudy & ragged, the message they create is usually simple and clear.
Precise and unambiguous sartorial message have their place in the real world too. Whenever you want to transmit a clear message to an audience, dress with a minimalist approach in mind. Identify the message, and choose items according. An everyday example should illuminate: how you would dress for a job interview in a conservative profession?
The typical dark suit, white shirt, simple tie, and black shined shoes conveys a simple and reductive message: “I am precise, professional, capable. and trustworthy”. Other examples would be dressing to look attractive to potential mates, dressing to give a presentation, dressing for a cocktail party, and so on. The resultant looks are varied, but share a common denominator of often being described as elegant. Elegance is thus conforming to social rules & expectations in a focused & precise manner while still appearing to do so effortlessly. This is the laser-like coherence of a focused and unambiguous sartorial message.
Can one dress in an expressionist manner instead? Yes, but with caution. Expressionism in dressing is far more risky. You can inadvertently reveal far more about your actual state of mind than you intend. Remember, Expressionism is your subjective experience of the world, albeit in this context through an outfit rather than through paint or stone. It is inherently more incoherent in its message than a minimalist approach. A clear message can still emerge (and indeed, should emerge) but it is a message that the viewer has interpreted. By wearing the proverbial heart on one’s sleeve, the dresser cedes some degree of control to the viewer. Done in an uncontained way, the outfit may elicit either discomfort or downright dislike, without the observer necessarily being able to pinpoint why.
But if done well, it can be used to create a more subtle sense of being at ease with the dresser. The look appear on the surface to be shabby or garish, and yet it somehow brings a smile and warmth rather than a disapproving eyebrow. This is the power of trust. Rather than feeling the need to convey a precise message, the message is an unthreatening “hello, pleased to meet you. I’m me”.
Beware: this is not the same as wearing whatever you want all the time! Done carelessly, that can all too easily result in a message of “F*** you, I’m here”, which, I think you’ll agree, is a rather disagreeable thing to project. Just as an Expressionist artist applies conscious thought to his work, so must the Expressionist dresser apply though to what elements best convey a perceptual mindset. This harks back to an enfant chéri of mine, the importance of personal insight. Understanding the person you are is vital to being able to confidently convey that sense of self with an outfit. That is the powerful and charming effect described as “being comfortable in one’s own skin”… or in this case, “being comfortable in one’s own clothes”.
Giving of yourself to others, done in safe and judicious small measures, can be remarkably charming. It is an expression of trust that can inspire the same from others. Trying to do it in a small way with your clothes may be one of the safest mediums within which to do it. Experiment with it and see the results!
Patrick Nagel - Isetan
This blog gets a varied readership at times, reflecting as it does my own interests which range from the philosophical on one hand to fashion on the other. I therefore couldn’t resist the somewhat cryptic title, though I must now disappoint the ethicists expecting a post about Thomas Nagel, and instead delight the sartorialists with a post about Patrick Nagel.
Nagel got his big break illustrating that venerable icon of men’s special interest literature (Playboy) but became more widely known in the 1980s partly through illustrating a famous Duran Duran album cover, and then because of his fashion illustrations. Famous for his bold, posterised depictions of beautiful women wearing elegant, if rather revealing, garments, his work has echoes of Art Deco but also a more timeless, almost Iconic quality. Though I suspect the Virgin Mary might balk at the idea of posing for a Nagel illustration.
Nagel passed away from a heart attack before he reached 40. Perhaps appropriately for a pop-art figure, he died of a heart attack after appearing in that most faddy of mid-1980s events, an aerobics-themed charity telethon. Now enough talk, and more Nagel pictures instead. And that’s the kind of altruistic yet self-serving generosity that those readers who expected a Thomas Nagel post should appreciate as well…
Patrick Nagel - Sunglasses
Patrick Nagel - Shannon
Patrick Nagel - Blue Sweater
Cover of Departures
In today’s world of TV on demand, there remains great value in having live television quietly on in the background of a room while busy doing something else. Just occasionally, it causes one to stumble upon something that captures the imagination and draws attention away from other tasks. Such was the happy case last night that led me to watch Departures.
The 2009 Foreign Language Oscar-winning film tells the story of a cellist, Daigo, who unexpectedly loses his orchestra job, is forced to return to his hometown, and almost accidentally finds work as a nokanshi, an “encoffiner” who is responsible for ritually preparing the body for burial.
The movie tells of his growing pride in his work as he masters the movements and techniques involved in the death ritual, and of his growing understanding of the emotional importance of his role in helping bereaved families reconnect the corpse with the living person for one last goodbye. The other threads of the movie – his relationships with his wife, his father and his neighbours – are woven beautifully together over the last 20 minutes into a poignant and uplifting climax.
I will not reveal more plot details, for fear of spoiling the movie for others who have not yet seen it, but it is a work that demonstrates something rather special about the Japanese attitude. Daigo’s developing emotions and conceptual understanding of the power of his work (despite its low social status in Japan) reveal an acceptance of death. But this is not a fatalistic outlook. Instead it is an acknowledgement of death as life. Death becomes a way of reconnecting with the living, making the dead person more alive in the memory than they were in actuality. If death is life, so too does the movie suggest that ugliness is beauty and tragedy is joy. These are not depicted as opposite sides of the same coin, which is about as close as many thoughtful Western attitudes to this topic would get, but rather that the coin has no sides.
The unity of these experiences – for Daigo, and the viewer – is what creates poignancy and hope. Death becomes not something to be overcome in a search for meaning and immortality, but something to be experienced and “done well”. This is an attitude I find both intellectually and emotionally very appealing, though it remains a harder challenge to fully live it on a deeper level.
As our societies struggle with various ethical difficulties associated with aging and dying (dementia, assisted suicide, euthanasia, etc.), Departures is brave enough to tell a different story: one of hope and fulfilment.
Living in Oxford, one is constantly surrounded by cultural and architectural marvels. It’s easy to become blasé about the opportunities this offers. Take the Ashmolean Museum, which recently underwent a major multimillion pound refurbishment. I have revisited it since it reopened (and keenly anticipate the re-opening of the Egyptian wing after further gallery modernisation work), but it took a visit from family to prompt me to look at the current Heracles to Alexander the Great exhibition.
The exhibition features some extraordinary finds from the ancient royal city of Aegae. The first capital of the Macedonians, Aegae was home to the Temenid dynasty which ruled over the land for centuries and included both Philip II and his even more famous son, Alexander the Great.
Aegae was excavated in the 1970s by Professor Manolis Andronikos, who discovered the tombs of King Philip II and other members of Alexander’s immediate family, and these excavations were continued more recently by Dr Angeliki Kottaridi. Many of the tombs were found in undisturbed condition, yielding beautiful artifacts.
The museum does not permit photography within the exhibition area, but these photos in this post are from their press release and reveal the beauty of some of the items. The golden Medusa at the top of the post is taken from tomb of Philip II – the workmanship is magnificently intricate. It is one of two found in the tomb, and would originally have adorned a linen cuirass (breastplate) as a device to avert evil, and so protect the wearer. The gold myrtle wreath below is from the tomb of Meda, his Thracian princess wife, and while pretty enough, the photo below does not reveal the spectacular detail of the wreath nor the delicacy of the work that is evident in real life.
The exhibition includes many other remarkable finds, including solid silver drinking sets, golden burial outfits and more. But what struck me even more forcefully than the bling were portions of the wall frescos found at Aegae.
Most people, if asked to describe Greek Art, would recall the typical black & red earthenware designs. Figures are painted in profile, in stylised poses and with minimal perspective/foreshortening. The frescos are entirely differently. They are painted in a naturalistic style, in glorious technicolour, and include three-quarter profile figures which demonstrate a clear grasp of foreshortening. It is probably my own fault for not being aware of this strand of Greek Art before, but I was blown away by how modern in style these paintings appeared:
Alexander on his favourite stallion, Bucephalus, image source embedded as link
The exhibition was tautly edited; almost every piece was revelatory, demonstrating how much depth there is to this period of history. If you have the opportunity to vist the Ashmolean before the 29th of August, I strongly recommend paying the small entry fee to the exhibition and seeing what fresh knowledge you take away from the impressive artifacts on display.
Fashion designers tend to have exotic backgrounds, but Emilio Pucci – aristocrat, Olympic skier, wartime fascist, later elected politician – probably qualifies as having one of the more eccentric.
Born into Florentine nobility, he continued to live and work in the beautiful ancestral Pucci Palace for most of his life. His brightly coloured geometric prints gained popularity after the Second World War, and by the ’60s, it was to Emilio Pucci that Dallas-based Braniff International Airways turned for their End of the Plain Plane campaign to modernise their image.
The campaign encompassed both the plane livery and flight crew uniforms and certainly caught the eye. Braniff became one of the most profitable airlines in the business. Those were the days when air hostesses could be marketed as the glamorous trolley-dollies of the skies, as Braniff’s advertising from the latter part of the era suggests:
In the end, Braniff over-expanded after the airline industry deregulated, and subsequently collapsed into bankruptcy, a collapse referenced explicitly in the iconic ’80s film Wall Street. But their idea of employing a famous fashion designer to create flight crew uniforms lived on. Singapore Airlines’ famous dress is by Pierre Balmain, Korean Air recruited Gianfranco Ferre, Air France had Lacroix draw up their design, and British Airways recently turned to Julien MacDonald of the House of Givenchy to spruce up their outfits.
Pucci’s outfits for Braniff were bold, characterised by unusual touches such as the bubble hat depicted in the first photo. This plastic helmet protected a stewardess’ complex coiffure from the elements as she walked from terminal to jet.
So why a post on Pucci?
Only because I happen to be wearing my own little bit of Pucci today in the form of a tie of more recent vintage (as can be seen in my outfit below left), which closely echoes the original 1960s design of the air hostess uniform (below right, image from Chelsea Marketeers):
I love it when clothes tell a story!
