Do you love The Shining? How about the work of avant-garde impersonator artist Cindy Sherman? You're reading Dazed, so what am I talking about, of course you do.
Well my friends, you're in luck! Today in Paris, designer Jun Takahashi showed an Undercover collection that brilliantly managed to combine both, with a good dose of surrealism thrown in for good measure. Things kicked off with the music from Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 classic playing, and out walked the models in twosomes. You see where this is going?
The twin-like girls wore looks that blended retro Americana with something darker: think 50s skirts and button up cardis, but with pearl earrings that were dented, or with rockabilly leopard print mixed in. There were even tiny skulls perched atop picnic baskets, beaded black cats, and hands holding Snow White style apples. Also, for the second time this week (Dries Van Noten being the first), there were lots of very Schiaparelli surrealist mouths, embroidered with glittering beads.
But the best part? The major Cindy Sherman moments, which took the artist’s self-portraiture (in which she transforms into a series of different, often surreal and strange characters) and incorporated it into the clothing.
Tribute style t-shirts have been big lately, but Takahashi took things a step further, showing Nirvana-esque tees with some of Sherman’s famous Untitled Film Stills self portraits on them. Then came a series of baroque dresses which featured Sherman’s face in the pattern, photo print looks which saw her likeness stretch over an entire skirt or top, and one dress which included an image from her Comme des Garçons campaign (Rei Kawakubo was, after all, an early supporter of Takahashi). Sherman’s name even came embroidered onto the clothes.
The show ended with a series of models in the famous blue dresses like those worn by The Shining’s iconic twins – only one was covered in red strings of beads, like drops of blood. They marched through the space hand in hand – providing a truly creepy ending to a brilliantly uncanny show.
