EXCERPT: RICK OWENS FALL 2023 - PARIS FASHION WEEK

 


"...Aware that Owens is no stranger to the darker, avant-garde of aesthetics, what struck me in regards to Owens 2020 and 2021 collections was the imprint of his cultish manifestations in representing the oracle, that is of the feminine.  When in meditation, holds an intrinsic ability of intuition, heightened when it is graced by manifestations of the occult.   She becomes the harbinger of doom, which would be prudent to learn from its instinctive realm.  To be aware of the folly of our making, within an unforgiving universe.  Yes, we are certainly living in dark times, despite our technological prowess our fraught conditioning and overconfidence is probably going to be our downfall.

Intermixed with Owens witch like oracle collections over the said period, was his men's styles, that offered a more blunt and aggressive take on the masculine, during the pandemic period of 2020/2021 and then with his Spring 2022 men's collection, which was the final of the Lido beachfront shows, paradoxically became a liberating and positive showpiece as Owens's stint in Venice was coming to end and he and Lamy were to return to their home in Paris.

So, there are interesting dualities of a designer who has toyed with the transgressions of life,  as a visual show piece seen with his stylizations since 2002.  Owens consistency and ability to draw from his own backlog of collections, does indeed show the adeptness of a designer whose earlier roots are from his Los Angeles artfulness.   With a history, which I explored, albeit as an article for a fashion magazine in 2020,  holds clues to this enigmatic and in someways ambiguity of a fashion designer, who had crafted his own imprint onto an industry without compromise..."


(A.Glass 2023)

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