Born Lee McQueen, but encouraged to change his name to something more glamorous by the late Isabella Blow, Alexander McQueen's low riding “bumsters”, or pants that hung just below the butt cleavage, put him on the map in the early 90’s, and while critics were torn about the style, fans raved about them (Watson: 137). McQueen continued to add shock value to each style he developed thereafter, whether through showmanship, theatrics, or dramatic subject manner. Due to an unlikely tenure working as a couturier at Givenchy, McQueen’s work has acquired extraordinary elements of precision and tailoring. The time at Givenchy may have allowed McQueen to add an element of glamour to his usually crass work. Whether making a scene with each fashion show always outdoing the previous, or providing a type of performance art that is much more about a movement than a line of clothing, Alexander McQueen is considered one of the most influential designers of the 21st century.
He has stretched the boundaries of fashion to the point where his taste level has been criticized. For example, in his 1995 collection entitled ‘Highland Rape’, McQueen dressed his models in “bloodied, tattered lace dresses” on the London Fashion Week runways (Socha: 92). While the show was called “ aggressive and disturbing” by Women’s Wear Daily and there were accusations of a “misogynistic” theme, McQueen claimed the collection alluded to the Jacobite rebellion and the “rape” of Scotland by England (Entwistle: 202). During this time, coverage of “genocides” (especially of Bosnia and Rwanda) was particularly popular in the Western press (Entwistle: 203). McQueen’s collection also coincides with the release of the now legendary big screen hit Braveheart, which also portrayed the harsh realities of Scotland’s fight against England. McQueen has described his work as “Eclectic verging on the criminal”, showing that he embraces the spectacle aspect of his work, almost as if he is a costume designer, dressing characters for a movie (Phaidon: 303). He may very well have used this element to stand out in the saturated marketplace by using the interest in genocide as subject matter. Eventually, McQueen worked theatrical themes, not only into the clothing he designed, but also in the fashion shows themselves. In his 2008 Spring Ready to Wear collection, McQueen used elaborate head pieces as a tribute to Isabella Blow, a Vogue sylist credited for discovering several influential designers including McQueen, who committed suicide last May (some claim that McQueen was an indirect cause).
Despite McQueen’s crass manner and blue-collar roots (he is the son of a taxi driver), he was signed for a 3-year contract in 1996 as the couturier of Givenchy, a move described in The End of Fashion as Bernard Arnault’s attempt at the “power of publicity” (Agins: 48). Arnault most likely signed McQueen because of his rising popularity, whether outlandish or not, to succeed John Galliano for Givenchy. While McQueen hardly seemed an appropriate candidate for the prestige that had come to be known as haute couture, the 4 years spent at Givenchy seemed to have an immense effect on the remarkable cutting techniques he developed. The fit is similar to that of a couturier, with pain-staking attention to tailoring. Even his suits used a mixture of angles and curves to distinguish them from the traditional silhouette (Watson: 298). Though McQueen’s work continued to have shocking themes and theatrical hoopla, the later collections also have an element of glamour to them that may have developed in his time at Givenchy.
In the latter part of the 1990’s, fashion experimented with “representations of death, trauma, alienation, and decay” as is indicated in Caroline Evan’s Fashion at the Edge: Spectacle, Modernity, and Deathliness (Evans). Evans claims that, during this time, McQueen had a “fascination with the dynamics of power” especially between “predator and prey” (153). For his 1997 collection entitled “It’s a Jungle Out There”, models perfectly depicted the Thomson’s gazelle, a deer-like animal with long horns, dark eyes and white, black and tan markings on the side (Evans: 153). The gazelle was most likely chosen as a main theme because is known to be low on Africa’s food chain. McQueen correlates the animal’s circumstance to that of a designer saying, “we can all be quite easily discarded”, a fact which was particularly true during the nineties and even more so now (Evans: 153). McQueen’s subject matter only seems to get more outrageous with his recent collections. Though McQueen may choose popular subject manner for his collections, his clothing has never appeared to heed to specific consumer demands, a fact which may contribute to his appeal. Part of the reason for his popularity is that his work is as much about the presentation and performance of the show as it is about the clothes. McQueen was one of the first to use extreme measures to make his fashion shows as erotic and exciting as the clothing. His creativity and showmanship never seizes to have critics raving, whether good or bad reviews. His recent collections have the skill in precision to back up his outrageous theatrics as well. Alexander McQueen proves the age old theory that fashion is not just about what you put on your body; it is a movement, a form of art that draws from life and should have meaning. McQueen’s work has that lively quality to it; he gives his audience not just a collection of pieces that each have a story, but a style that makes going to his shows an experience all its own.
Information Cited From:
Agins, Teri. The End of Fashion. New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1999
Entwistle, Joanne and Elizabeth Wilson. Body Dressing. Oxford: Berg Publishers, 2001
Evans, Caroline. Fashion at the Edge: Spectacle, Modernity and Deathliness. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003.
Hodge, Brook. Skin and Bones. New York: Thames and Hudson, 2006 (pictures)
“McQueen strikes a blow for late editor”. The Sydney Morning Herald. 7 Oct 2007. SMH.com.au. Google. San Diego Mesa College Lib. 8 March 2008
Socha, Miles. “The Real McQueen”. Women’s Wear Daily. Volume 191. Issue 69 (2006): 92-94. EBSCOhost.San Diego Mesa College Lib. 4 March 2008 http://www.ebscohost.com
The Fashion Book. New York: Phaidon Press, 1998
“Tres Sportif and Ultra-Glam”. Women’s Wear Daily Volume 194. Issue 74 (2007): 6-7. EBSCOhost. San Diego Mesa College Lib. 9 March 2008 http://www.ebscohost.com
Watson, Linda. 20th Century Fashion. Buffalo: Firefly Books, 2004
