Dutch fauvist painter Kees van Dongen inspired the artful, frequently stunning Fall 2008 collection by Vera Wang, which she showed early Thursday morning, Feb. 7, in Bryant Park. Van Dongen's charged portraits of women, with their crimson lips, emotive, smoky eyes, and draped in loose folds of richly colored fabric, proved to be a ripe starting point for Wang, who was an art history major in college. Wang's collections exude romantic eroticism in a way that is as sensuous as van Dongen's paintings are...
Fauvism ("les fauves" or "wild beasts" was how this circle of artists was known, Henri Matisse and Georges Braque among them) is characterized by strong brush strokes and vivid colors in their depictions of French bohemian society.
In van Dongen's paintings, silk stockings might peek out from underneath a lifted hem. For Wang, opaque stockings could be viewed beneath sheer slips of silk gauze, with an overpowering allure of transparency taking hold. That which is revealed (the legs) still remains concealed.
Or take the contrast of delicately executed plisse in rust against a charcoal felt top - it sat like the trace of one of von Dongen's subject's lipstick kisses on a glass as it sips red wine.
The languid drape of a cashmere cardigan over a dusty rose washed silk blouse might elicit ebullient swoons and sighs on a plush velvet chaise in the drawing room as one flirts with a gentleman caller.
In this collection, the back especially became a source of intense erotic pleasure. A tutu train shapes and molds the backside into the ultimate rounded object of lust, again both concealing and enhancing. The irony being, of course, that it can only be appreciated as this creature, who epitomizes elegance, walks away from her admirers, leaving intense longing in their wake.
But ultimately, the main message at Vera Wang was in the drape, as in the fashions worn by the women in van Dongen's sultry paintings. Whether it was in the drape of a dress, the way a skirt cut on the bias was pleated asymmetrically on the hip and fell off the body just so, or even in the way a pair of silk twill leggings clung and slouched on the leg at the hem, it was all about the way fabric wrapped, concealed, revealed or reshaped the female form.
A running motif in the Fall 2008 collections in New York has been that of the sexy, disheveled intellectual. She's feminine, but with an edge of impropriety, the guilty mistress engaging in an early morning walk of shame. She's feminine enough to win the affections of a hundred and one suitors, but not entirely forthcoming - an air of mystery is key. In Wang’s case, this means wading through a few layers of sculpted Japanese techno tapestry, hammered satin twill or silk gauze first.
photos courtesy of Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week
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Article Courtesy of Fashion Wire Daily
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