Khan, N. n. (2012). Cutting the Fashion Body: Why the Fashion Image Is No Longer Still. Fashion Theory: The Journal Of Dress, Body

From Digital Culture & Society

Khan, N. n. (2012). Cutting the Fashion Body: Why the Fashion Image Is No Longer Still. Fashion Theory: The Journal Of Dress, Body Kiyosha Teixeira

The fashion image we witness today is part of the ever-changing digital landscape we are currently in, author of this essay and professor at the University of the Arts London, Nathalie Khan, considers 'digital' (a very particular distinction in comparison to other authors covering the topic) fashion film to challenge the conventions of a new high-gloss form of representation via fashion media. The general consensus of Khan suggests that the digital media and sensory overload load we have become accustomed to will eventually lead up to the static image becoming obsolete.

With little to no focus on fashion as a mediated form of communication and/or representation Khan inserts her research with that of Laura Mulvey and Anne Friedberg's work on the digital image and time in regards to spectator theory, however, there was no discussion bridging these two concepts and applying them to fashion. With the ability to produce and disseminate content, Khan notes that in the last decade fashion film has become an increasingly “independent genre”. As many fashion houses such as Chanel, Dior, and Miu Miu have hired small production companies as well as notable filmmakers like David Lynch, John Cameron and Harmony Korine to commission fashion films. Khan makes reference to a pioneer in fashion film, Nick Knight, who created the interactive fashion media platform called SHOWstudio. In contrast to the filmmakers like David Lynch, Knight’s approach to fashion film is deeply rooted in technological advancements and the need to change how we experience and perceive fashion, essentially moving away from the commerciality and bending the conventions of filmmaking to create a moving image.

There are clear creative intentions that differentiate between fashion film and fashion in film, where the cinematic film is “controlled by the time frame in which it is shown” (p. 2) Khan suggests that cinematic film samples time, however, through cross-cutting, continuity and editing tactics are able to preserve narrative fidelity. The digital realm of media, however, creates an illusion of “permanent present” in which the “notion that the flow of images is not restricted by time or the space in which the image is shown” (p.236). Khan bridges this concept with that of fashion as it’s general nature is perceived as short-lived. Khan like many other scholars and producers of the genre believes that fashion film provides encourages a shift from the viewer as a consumer to the view as a spectator she furthers this notion by saying:

In this context images of fashion are not simply a vehicle of consumption relying on the discourse of commodity fetishism, as is the case with fashion advertising. Instead one could argue that fashion film aims to break down boundaries between consumption and representation, by relying on cinematic language. This implies that fashion film no longer merely depends on the illusionary concealment of the creation of value through the spectacle of the image, but offers the spectator an aestheticization of voyeurism. This is particularly apparent through the use of narrative in fashion film, which implies a shift from the viewer as a consumer to the viewer as a spectator. (p.237)

Making note of this differentiation is important to understand the functions of fashion film, it implies that the fashion film works to do more than sell clothes or be imparted to a grander narrative. Some films are grouped under the “soft cinema” category in which Lev Manovich describes “a space in which the digital image relies on new structures through which the production and consumption of fashion images are altered by and through technology” comparing the work of Knight and Lynch, Khan makes the distinction between the creative eye of whom is directing a particular fashion film. She refers to Knight’s expertise of fashion being based on the fact that he himself, is a fashion photographer and his image of fashion differs from a filmmaker who uses fashion as a narrative tactic rather than letting the clothes “speak for themselves” per se. Khan refers to the correlation between the still and moving images having deeply connected roots to fashion photography calling on scholar Roland Barthes definition of a photograph as

being “a motionless image, this does not mean only that the figures it represents do not move; it means that they do not emerge, do not leave: they are anesthetized and fastened down, like butterflies” in this instance the photographic image encapsulates the “essence of now” and freezes time included in these notions, is the fact that the stillness and time-sensitivity of the still photo will ultimately be reflected in the analysis of the fashion film focusing on time, fragmentation and sense of play in terms of spectatorship. Khan again uses Mulvey’s work on the image to explain that the fashion photograph is iconic and the images film counterpart being symbolic, as the spectator is able to visualize and interact with all parts of the fashion circle.

In her conclusion, Khan suggests that “The Fashion Body” is not merely a site of projection rather she sees it as an “imaginary anatomy” as digital media has allowed us to interact with fragments of the body layering meaning and symbolism. Her correlation between who produces the image was very intriguing as a filmmaker and fashion photographer have a very distinct vision of fashion, dress, time and space and thus “Cinematic film creates a sense of linear time. The photograph is forever locked in the past and the digital image offers permanent presence. Fashion is caught in its own reflection--locked in the past it has begun to move and is part of a new and permanent presence” (p.249). The fashion film is an emerging media form that expands the notions and perceptions of technology, imagery, mediated communication and representation as well as the preconceived notions towards the ephemerality attached to fashion itself.