from the chiasmus archive: "Yohji Yamamoto. Menswear. Spring 2022." Posted June 29th, 2021 by CHIASMUS MAGAZINE BLOG

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(Images: Yohji Yamamoto 2022)

Yohji Yamamoto’s sepulchral themes continue on after his Fall 2021 Ready-to-Wear showing, whilst also, as described in my review , revealing what feels like a Delphic oracle appeal at least in an aesthetic sense.  Yamamoto is very much the cryptic story teller of a career that has spanned over 50 years, he is also considered a master. Yet in what seemly feels, in the shadow of his recent shows, like a sombre Japaneses poise and I say this with an up most respect, the reflection is of a flawed master.   Like all of us, as seen by Zen lore, one never truly attains masterfulness, it is our flaws that must be accepted, through our suffering and pain.  To endure and to let go is enlightenment.  Nirvana or heaven is within the mindset and so is hell, not some mystical place of redemption.   It is that we redeem ourselves through the simplicity of living.    Yet, despite this, the material world is distracting and powerful in its illusion.   How does one balance this turmoil with meditation? 

Yamamoto’s work ethic for all his signature brand/s has been relentless over the years, including his fixation of designing clothes which hold an admirable keepsake from the famed designer, that is, in all retrospection his meditation.  Five decades of focus and a meticulous eye for defining a style, like his contemporary, Rei Kawaburo, of the modern day avant-garde.  That both he and Kawakubo created as a precedence in the early 1980s when they descended from Japan onto Paris, to not only rework Couture but define the iconic gothic asymmetrical looks, with its linen and fine wool layering in the decades that followed.    His influence on fashion has been unparalleled,  but it is Yamamoto’s paradox that holds a charm of the aging designer. 

For his Spring 2022 collection, the avant-garde is of course notably evident, but more so another aspect of Japanese/Western influences to which both cultures have, over the many years, crossed over and melded their cultural imprints.    Yamamoto has been steadily incorporating the surrealist or Dadaist influences into that Japan embraced in the 1920s, particularly the famous “Mavo” art movement of the same period, pushing forward  their anarcho-artistic theory that life is art and art is life, by using traditional industry conceptualizations of typography and print making as a form of protest against establishment.   Dadaism has had a profound effect on Japan, which can still be seen to this day, that being the lost-in-translation of English phrasing and words on advertising and fashion, further confounding not only what could be seen as a Zen perspective of meaning but also exasperating the sui generis Japanese interpretation of Western concepts.     

Yamamoto’s latest array fuses his 80’s gothic styles onto Mavo Daddism, while allowing a functionality to shine through with the looks on display.  Mirroring, within its darkness, a tough and resilient collection, whilst portraying the beauty of a weather beaten look, which is distinctly masculine in its appeal.   The layering and draped ensembles hold true to Yamamoto’s stylization, with the Dadaist typography mixed with collage prints by the Japanese artist Yuuka Asakura gives the collection a rebellious touch.

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(A.Glass 2021)