6 May 2005 – 17 July 2005
Maria Chen Pascual
Julian & Sophie
Justin.oH
In a move away from recent fashion exhibitions Chinese Arts Centre in collaboration with Flux Magazine are interested in unearthing and revealing something of the creative process behind designer’s work as opposed to purely presenting finished garments.
They have chosen designers who are innovators, whose practice is fluid and whom they felt would embrace the challenge with energy and creativity. They work collaboratively, experimentally, questioning the structures of the industry, across art form, across cultures, blurring the boundaries between fashion and art.
Julian & Sophie, To Future Generations of Ourselves, 2005
Sophie Cheung and Julian Roberts’ video installation represents their design lives to a future unknown audience. Their ‘message in a bottle’ concept is constructed from a series of animated video loops, showing diverse and tenuous inspirations/ research/ starting points/ cultural references that attach themselves to their fashion work:
“ Sometimes we just find ourselves in the middle of somewhere new and can’t remember how exactly we got there or why, it’s a place we often occupy called the ‘Here & Now’. It’s in these brief moments that we get to see who we really are: our individuality, our mortality, and our togetherness. The basic need we both have to draw & cut & sew & make videos & websites & communicate is not satisfied in the act of actually doing such activities. We never do exactly what we think we should be doing. It’s a battle we can never entirely win: There can never be enough time. It is necessary always for the project in hand to be bigger than what is actually achievable, and that the things we end up achieving not be the things we set out to do originally, and that in doing them we forget & extend our purpose, and drift into deeper waters, losing our thread completely. These videos are about today, yesterday, 5 minutes ago & tomorrow…. the life cycle of a creative fashion idea, the delicacy in which our physical & creative lives balance…. all played out at breakneck speed a bit like our whole lives flashing before our eyes”.
Each video has been edited to visually depict Julian & Sophie’s ‘current 10 favourite songs of all time’, looping simultaneously in and out of sync with each other: “Together they show the journeys 2 designers went through in April 2005: a series of loops oscillating within a larger loop, somewhere on the brink of explosion or implosion.”
“It’s like this every month.”
Biography: Julian and Sophie (Julian Roberts and Sophie Cheung) have been touted as being the new kids on the block in the fashion world, continually challenging the conventions of the industry. Combining Julian’s intricate cutting and Sophie’s abstract graphic embroidery their execution is ‘playfully indiscriminate and haphazard’. Sophie Cheung and Julian Roberts both trained at RCA, as well as Glasgow School of Art and Newcastle-upon-Tyne respectively. Julian Roberts is the youngest Head of Fashion (at Hertfordshire University) and has incorporated students into their practice, through Parc des Expositions.
Julian and Sophie collections are always playful yet simultaneously challenging of the fashion norms that we adhere to, they questioned the relevance of fashion shows at a time of war with a bed-in (John Lennon and Yoko Ono style) and a collection of pyjamas. One Fashion Week the duo decided against presenting a catwalk of finished garments, opting to be more daring and spontaneous producing 10 dresses in a single day under the watchful eye of the press. Their share and share alike attitude has been reasserted in their most recent quirky enterprise, an on-line pattern cutting school, the step-by-step guide allows for patterns to be downloaded free of charge by everyone – removing the exclusivity of fashion.
Maria Chen Pascual with Staale Bruland, Horizon, 2005
“Since 1949, when China split into Mainland China and Taiwan, the Nationalist government in Taiwan dedicated itself to move toward democratisation, modernisation, and industrialisation. The national policy was to model the United States and Western Culture. Not only have changes in the social systems but also in social values resulted from the trend of democratisation, modernisation, and industrialisation. “ Pai –Shu Huang, July 1998, University of Missouri – Kansas City
“My ancestors immigrated to Taiwan from Mainland China over 400 years ago. Granddad owned his first car in the sixties. It was of the American brand Ford, and the only car in his village, Ke-Kau.
My father aspired to moving to the States, where he felt he could make a better living. My mother and father met through a matchmaker and moved to Middle America in 1971. There they purchased their first car, again a second-hand Ford.
This exhibition is a window to a young couple’s search for their own paradise; combining influences of their individual cultures combined with western ideals in search for a better life; a journey from one place to another. My parents ventured to the States aspiring to the Western ideals taught to them in Taiwan. It is a direct reflection of my own Taiwanese-American upbringing paralleled with my desire to move to the UK to become fashion designer. Similar to myself Staale came from Norway aspiring to be recognised artistically and musically. Our separate journeys to London eventually brought us together through mutual artistic aims and passions, thus inspiring the content of this show”.
Biography: Maria Chen Pascual is a London based designer. Brought up in the United States, she was trained at Parson’s College in New York City, where she was awarded the Hermés Menswear Design Scholarship. She moved to London to take an MA at Central St Martin’s, and continued her education by taking on a research degree at the Royal College of Art in 1998.
Maria is best known for her original raw hands-on fabric techniques and conceptual cutting. Initially attracted to fashion, anti-fashion, as a means of expressing herself whilst feeling frustration with the hierarchies of American high-school, past themes for her work have included faerie folklore, Eighties underground club culture, propaganda and war. She has had design commissions from Thomas Goode for a platinum tableware collection, Topshop for a range of clothing and an exclusive range designed for Oki-ni. Her clients include David Bowie and Bjork.
Norwegian born Staale Krantz Bruland, came to London in a search of fortune in 2001, is now a musician and a member of the London based band, Cherubs, after finishing his degree at Byam Shaw School of Art in 2004. Working much around the expression “Is the grass greener on the other side” Staale is exploring journeys to “the better” from seed to fulfilment and the construction of the mental images that make us look to the horizon.
Justin.oH, Grace, 2005
Justin.oH’s piece, Grace, consisting of a bicycle, an antler, a large animal skin, a step ladder and parts wrapped in bias cotton tape, is an artwork; a metaphor for the final product shown on the catwalk. It suggests the cyclical nature of the creation of each collection, the need for continuity, respect for things that have been but also moving it forward, ‘there is no set formula in the creation of a collection; each has its own personality and awkwardness’. Making the work itself was for Justin a ‘hugely enjoyable and liberating mini-break from the ‘cycle’ of the fashion system’, which he has been working to for the last 10 years. ‘It is important for me to say that fashion is about beauty and the importance of enjoying it, it’s one of the toughest professions to be in’.
With every season, with the selection of themes, colours, fabrics, trimmings, skills and models, there is ultimately one desire that drives this engine – that is to create an image that is so potent, strong, definitive – the dream of creating a style beast, something wholly unique. It is a painful and pleasurable process – this piece represents a juxtaposition of all this.
Communicating the influences in his designs in general, the piece has been influenced by British tailoring, the beauty and honesty of natural fabrics, man and machine, and nature. Echoing through out various collections are memories of different locations; riding to school on the back of a bike as a child in Malaysia, the unique scent of the hot and dusty Australian outback coupled with eucalyptus where he spent summers as a youngster, the colours of landscapes and journeying represented here by the bicycle.
Biography: Justin.oH’s design mantra is the re-invention of tradition. Malaysian-born Justin Oh worked at Charles Jourdan in Paris and, most notably, at Yohji Yamamoto in Tokyo. Justin was trained at St. Martins and RCA and established his label, Justin Oh, following sponsorship from Marks and Spencer in 1995. The London based design company has grown organically and is now in its 9th year, producing 2 men’s and 2 women’s collections a year.
He is known for his subversion of and twists on the wearable modern classic, taking inspiration from the traditions of our world heritage. Vintage detailing and finishing is used extensively and brought up to date, giving his clothes an effortless timelessness and quality. His Spring/ Summer 2005 collection was a re-invention of ‘East meets West’, fusing khakis with Asian batiks, soft floating fabrics with hard-wearing workman trousers, masculine and hard edged but rendered feminine. He designs for workingwomen in mind who are confident, feminine and independent. Not easily swayed by the vagaries of fashion, she is into style, quiet quality and timelessness.
Re-fashion is presented in collaboration with Flux Magazine.
