FLAVORFULL #018

the protocapitalist punk paradox

Last night I watched The Banshees of Inisherin and it was perfection. Some may find the movie silly or a poor representation of the Irish Civil war but I saw it as a genius exposition of the existentialism of remote humanity set against the backdrop of undefined and permanently unresolved conflict. The movie takes place on a fictional island off the coast of Ireland in 1923 and is strongly steeped in breathtaking pastoral visuals. However, what truly stands out is the deeply humanist screenplay. Devoid of plot at first glance, McDonagh’s script shouldn’t be faulted for this but acclaimed. The story merged the existentialist comedy of Waiting for Godot with postmodern sense of humor characteristic of processing generational trauma. I hope to see many awards for this movie and definitely, definitely recommend!

Books I’ve read recently and enjoyed: A re-read of Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy, (trans.) Leonard J. Kent, Nina Berberova (2000)—one of the greatest books ever written!

---

The Complex Legacy of Vivienne Westwood.

Dame Vivienne Westwood recently passed at the age of 81 leaving behind an unparalleled design legacy that transformed the world of punk, political protest, and high fashion, so why is her legacy so complexly contested amongst fashion’s subcultures? Did she sell out punk? Did she ridicule it? Did she ever cash a check and become mainstream? Yes, yes, and no and no. To attain such commercial success in any form of art, one must enter the capitalist arena. Some argue that in order to achieve true artistic freedom, an artist must achieve such mainstream commercial success that any dadaistic endeavor from there on out has total freedom to fund and express itself (for those who remember the controversial success of Maurizio Cattelan’s Art Basel Banana).

Vivienne Westwood with a Gimp Mask

What made Vivienne Westwood so powerful, despite (or even in spite of) her commercial success was the way in which she overhauled the proper aesthetic. For better or worse, Westwood created an eccentric mainstream movement that rewrote the boundaries in which we accepted fashion at a pivotal moment in the world’s sexual revolution and in fashion’s transition from haute couture to freedom into the work-force uniform du-jour.