From the chiasmus archive: October 6th, 2023 "Balenciaga Spring 2024 - Paris Fashion Week". In lieu of Demna Gvasalia stepping down from Balenciaga, after ten years, with his last couture showing for the iconic fashion brand occuring on July 9th 2025. I will be posting all of my Balenciaga reviews of the last 10 years*
Demna Gsvalia could be trying to mature as a fashion designer, with a slew of large scale and gimmicky shows under his belt and literally an unwritten blank cheque to fund them, via Kering the holding company of Balenciaga. There is no doubt that the Georgian designer has run into controversy along the way, juggling the prestige brand name of Balenciaga as just that, a brand name, while maintaining his backlash anti-fashion ethos. Which by its definition holds a contradiction, analysed in my review of Balenciaga's Pre-Fall 2023 collection, Demna has very much defined a niche exclusivity with Balenciaga, aimed at celebrities and their celebritydom fan base, relayed through social media feeds. But, the hype came crashing down after recent controversial ad campaigns, with product retraction and apology letters delivered, where else, but onto social media. While Demna's backlash fashion stance begins to where thin, with no counter culture, sans the hyper consumption from a multitude of market places, or reiteration of any artful digression, which correlates with Demna's Balenciaga. In other words, a simulacrum or artistic metaphors aimed specifically at growth markets. So, Demna's Balenciaga very much aligns itself within the hyperreal.
However, the trend that is forumating for 2024 is the Avant-garde with dashes of carnal, which has been an ongoing runway presence of the last five years. Yet, the layering and dark inclinations of Avant-garde fashion is a long lasting stylization that does exude a durable and slow fashion maturity, and as a trend has fluctuated within the last two decades, testament to one of the only surviving independent designers left, would be Rick Owens. So, it will be interesting to see if Demna can redefine his 1990's homage to Eastern European raver fashion, into a more gothic, hardy and layered style. But, will he be able to tone down the kitch and oversized fits?
Demna's latest array for Balenciaga is a mixture of both the benchmark of Gsvalia's brother's aesthetics, that being Guram of Vetemenet's, and their undeniable talent for stripping down streetwear and remodeling it into their meretricious extremity, has not gone amiss with Demna's Spring 2024 styles. However, the fusion of the more mature of his Avant-garde styles, with Demna's out of season Couture and extreme streetwear looks, have somewhat clashed for his Spring 2024 ensemble.
There does seem like a messier undertone, with some of the finer tailoring that has been see with his pre and post actual Couture showings toned down, while the fits look stuffy and more drapey. With Demna's exasperated and deconstructed sneaker styles, showing even more extra dimensions. And his motley crew of models that Demna's uses, don't at all offer a reprieve from the many contradictions of the Balenciaga template. I also find it hard to see, if there is a underlying statement of using a mixed bag of aging models for Demna's Spring styles, other than exploiting the aesthetics.
Overall, what can be seen is a tiring of Demna's Balenciaga, despite his ability to innovate a showpiece for each of his collections since he took the reigns from Alexander Wang, after Wang's Spring 2016 collection. The contrast between Wang's Balenciaga and Demna's is striking and Kering mostly views Balenciaga as one of the "Other Houses" in their quarterly financial reports. To which Gucci and Saint Laurent have been their main earners. Therefor the niche market for Balenciaga has mostly been aimed at Chinese/Asian consumers, and this could be unwinding via a Chinese economy that is finally slowing down.
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(A.Glass 2023)
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