Related #3: Do it like a Dude

Yesterday's post dealt with women who dress like men, or don't (Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain, I'm a-looking at you) to assert their power.

But where there are Queens, there are Kings...

And where there is power, there is also subservience...

So, to veer insanely from one end of a spectrum to another, here are some pictures of women who dress like men to show their love for a man.  Like a king.  The King, in fact. 

These photos were taken by Grey Villet in 1957 for TIME Magazine.  They show a day in the life of Susan Hull, who has decided to take the plunge and get an Elvis-style pompadour, joining the thousand strong ranks of girls and women in Grand Rapids, Michigan, who love Elvis so much that they want to look like him. 

If you want to put it in a modern context, imagine thousands of femme Justin Beiber fans, all with the same, super feathery, peekaboo, come-hither (but not too close, I'm a good Christian) hair*.  Just for the love of the Biebs.  Have you shuddered?  Has an icy cold finger of revulsion crawled down your back?  Good, let's look at the pictures.

All captions from the original article (because they're hilarious)



Susan Hull looks apprehensive as beautician prepare to form lock into Presley sidecurl




IN NEW GLORY: Nancy Hull happily shows off Presley cut.  Beautician who created style stresses convenience for girls who like swimming without caps.




CONFRONTING FATHER outside the beauty shop.  Susan Hull (left) and her sister Nancy, 20, display haircuts.  He was noncommital about new style.




COMFORTING MOTHER, Susan promises not to have her brown hair dyed black.  After showing cut to family, she gave ponytail to 4-year old brother.




CONVINCING SWEETHEART, Susan explains her coiffure to her beau Lew Potter in Motorcycle shop.  At first he threatened to break their next date.




CLIPPED GALLERY sits for a group portrait in Didgson's beauty shop.  The sideburns are standard but the number of stray locks on foreheads is optional


Read the original article here.

*Lesbians who look like Justin Beiber notwithstanding.  The Lesbiebers are awesome.

Kinda Sorta Love...

...The Eurovision, which for one night only turns everything the most amazing shade of camp.  This is the Serbian entry Nina, who sang... er, I have no idea.  In my mind, it sounds a bit like this.

Source



Need more pictures of this act. Source

  Coloured tights, bright colours, patterns, sharp bobs, heavy eye make-up, micro minis.  Remind you of anyone?

Sandie Shaw, Eurovision winner 1967.  Source

Odds and Sods

I've spent this weekend travelling (one and a half hour wait on a freezing platform, thank you Irish Rail) and working while sick, so I'm a little bit burnt out and uninspired.  I'm going on an enforced blog hiatus (I'm away from my computer and photos and such) and I'll be back on Thursday, hopefully reinvigorated by some family get togethers, cups of tea and plates of shortbread.  Ok, ok, I'm going to stop moaning... now. Here's a few bits that are looking mighty good to feverish ol' me at the moment.

This is my favorite Christmas song. When the horns come in...

My new shoes. They are fakey fake fake Miu Mius but they rock my socks. Incidentally, I should probably think about wearing socks with them. My toes are still sore from the last time I wore them out.

It's the End of the World as We Know It

Conor Walton is my favorite Irish artist.  His still lives are amazing, done in the style of the Dutch Masters - exploring similar themes using modern, everyday objects.  Sinister, sexy, funny, amazing.  He'll be giving a lecture on the aforementioned Dutch Masters in the National Gallery on December 14th.  He has stopped painting and taking commissions for the time being due to a personal matter (my mom is on his mailing list, feverishly waiting to snatch up a still life) so this will be a rare opportunity to interact with a great artist.

Have a great week everyone.  Hope it's a festive one!

Who invented the Typical Girl? A celebration of Ari Up

The Slits in 1977. Ari up is third from left.  Photo - Ian Dickson

"The Slits were a feral girl gang. Aged just 15 in 1977, singer Ari Up recalls being 'wild and crazy, like an animal let loose - but an innocent little girl with it, too'. From her striking image (tangled dreadlocks, knickers worn on the outside of her clothes) to her seemingly pre-social antics, Ari inspired fear and fascination in equal measure".

- Simon Reynolds in Rip it up and Start Again

Note the knickers-over-trousers.  Photo - Caroline Coon.  

Stupidly, one of the posts that I've left on the back burner was a remembrance of Ari Up, a punk singer and forming member of The Slits. Their songs were a formative influence on me when I first went to college and was experiencing first-hand what it meant to grow up and be a woman and not someone who treated Sex and the City like a lifestyle Bible. Cut has to be one of my favourite albums. If you ever have a bad day wondering why that hot guy only likes the other hot girls, or if WAGS make you despair of your life, or bad that you don't have the same waistspan as Cheryl Cole, then listen to Typical Girls and feel much better for having the courage to just be yourself.

No prizes for guessing which one is Ari.  Photo - Ray Stevenson

Photo - Caroline Coon

From a style point of view though, Ari Up was an inspiration not in what she wore (there's NO way I could pull off the Superman look) but in her attitude towards clothing.  She wore what she wanted, when she wanted.  She had dreads piled up on top of her head like a modern day Rococo wig.  She wore facepaint twenty years before a legion of Oxegen and Glasto goers. She was variously Punk, proto-Goth and Rasta.  She applied the same freedom of thought to her wardrobe that she did to her lyrics.  She didn't really care about the judgement of others.  It suited her just fine.  And that is definitely something to admire.

Mixtapes @ The Glucksman - A closer look at Linder

This post has been a long time coming, and I certainly hope that I can do the subject justice, as I now schedule what must be the millionth post tonight before I head to London.



Last week I took a wander with my friend Hayret to the Glucksman Gallery, situated smack bang in the middle of a leafy enclave in the UCC campus grounds. Our target was the Mixtapes exhibition, which explores contemporary art through the work of artists who are heavily influenced by music.

It's fairly safe to assume that a majority of art is visual, and so the art involved is not so much involved with music itself as the visual aspects of music, like dancing, instruments, album covers and of course, the fashion that separates out followers of one musical tribe from another.  One of the things that drew me to punk as a young'un (and at a later stage, No Wave) was how different the clothing was to everyone elses.  It might seem like a shallow response, but that's because it is.  In my defense though, ask yourself, 'would Lady Gaga be half as interesting if she wore Clarks and sensible sack dresses instead of JC de Castelbajac and Thierry Mugler'?


Dancehall Danceoff from Sarah Doyle on Vimeo.

Sarah Doyle's artwork plays on a loop (I think her stuff will most definitely merit a much longer post when I have the time), zooming in and out on watercoloured ladies gyrating in tight denim, crop tops and bikinis to a tinny, merry-go-round sound.

The one artist that I came to see though, had her work displayed under glass at a small display table.  Here were a few works of Linder Sterling, an artist I knew from her simultaneously jarring and sexy collages from the late seventies to early eighties.  Like Cosi Fanni Tutti, but less obvious, or Duchamps with a decidedly feminist bent, Sterling succeeds where others have failed.  She manages to create a cohesive feminist statement, but remains a part of mainstream consciousness.  Her early work was concerned with music and her collages were used as covers for Buzzcocks singles, but today her work has been more broadly translated into fashion, with Richard Nicoll using her prints to form the basis of his A/W '09 collection.

Richard Nicoll's A/W '09 Collection.  Pics - style.com 

It isn't such a big jump from music to fashion and we can see that Sterling's work is easily applied to both.

Left - Sterling in 1981.  Right - Sterling's cover of i-D, October '09

Take the Punk Ladies series for example.  Sterling takes a photo and makes two different collages, the focus being on the new and different textures that are added to the clothes. 

The original photo

One of the resulting collages.

Want to see the other collage?  It's one in a series of three posters promoting the exhibition.  I've got one, which is tacked up safely on my fridge.  If you want to see it, maybe you should check out the exhibition or the Glucksman website (I know, I'm such a spoilsport).  Last I heard the posters were given away for free by patrons who mentioned the gallery's twitter feed, but this may not be the case anymore.  Free swag or no, it's still a must-see and Linder Sterling's work alone makes this well worth visiting.
The exhibition itself is well worth a visit and runs until October, should you want to spent a diverting afternoon learning, getting your fill of culture and generally having good, clean fun.

Hot models in dark places

I might be incredibly facetious here but it seems that the underlying trends when it comes to the new waves of promotional fashion film are dirty sub-bass dubstep sounds and flashing your boobs.  When you think about it, this all makes sense.  No, really, it does.

Fashion videos are about movement and highlighting contrast.  The dark of Gareth Pugh's matt leathers and Alexander Wang's rich velvets contrast with harsh bright light on pale skin.  The baring of more skin provides more of a contrast.  The whirling, the dancing and the lady parts on parade all provide part of the initial aesthetic experience.

Dubstep has a lot of bass.  A LOT of vibration.  What better music to pair with hot models in dark places?  There's no real point in me explaining any further.  Watch the videos and make up your own mind (NSFW, in case you didn't already know).



Music by Lukid



Music - The XX - Infinity (flufftronic remix)

P.S - The Licentiate column is out today in The Cork Independent. You can read here .

Anyone seen this?

The new M.I.A video for XXXO, which is being hailed by some as a new height in retro 80's cheese or a damning indictment of social networking sites (depending on whoever's overblown Youtube comment you want to believe).

Personally though, I like the video and have to give serious props to M.I.A for her style chops, She knows what she likes and doesn't listen to anyone else's opinion, which can only be commended.

What do you think? Retro throwback or MySpace circa 2007 nightmare?