ERINA MATSUI - A TOKYO NEO POP ARTIST: USING KAWAII AND KOWAI TO EXPRESS JAPANESE YOUNG GENERATIONS DIFFICULTIES IN FINDING THEIR IDENTITY

Tuesday, december 22, 2009

Once again, Tokyo shows that it remains the top spot for art market in Asia (and probably in all over the world). And many of its artists, whether they are man or woman, shows a natural taste for mixing kawaii (cute) and kowai (fear), two notions incredibly melt in Japanese pop culture, such as artists like Junko Mizuno, Mican or Kenichi Koyama, and many, many others, explore.

Food Chain - Star Wars ! 2008

Erina Matsui, twenty-five years old, graduated from Tama Art University in Tokyo (like Tomomi Kazumoto), the leading institution for teaching art in Japan, actually began her professional career very early. She started exhibiting at the age of twenty, showed in a collective exhibition of 32 japanese artists in Fondation Cartier in Paris in 2006, became a part of Yamamoto Gendai gallery in 2007, where she sold all of her paintings.

Self portrait EX, 2007

Erina Matsui definitely plays on the cute and disgusting grounds, using her experience and person, to describe a sort of nostalgic relationship with childhood, a feeling torn by dream and japanese pop culture and marketing, using motifs such as mushrooms, cosmos, toys,... Her art describes self-portraits, tortured, face deformed in expressions such as chaos, fear, surprise, dream, haunted by nostalgia, problems that young generations encounter in expressing themselves (Food Chain - Star Wars!), head filled with dreams and fantasy, picturing herself lost into Japanese pop culture such as manga (eyes size exaggerated in Self portrait EX or Erina ni Kugizuke) and incredibly kept and visible Japanese traditions (Dhooon). This nostalgia is part of the Japanese young generation, becoming a characteristic of the new Japanese society, visible in fashion (gothic lolitas, some aspect of Mori Girls) and in the way young women keep themselves into childhood (over using cute accessories such as ribbons, animal motifs, candy pink, but also speaking with a high tone and weak voice).

Dhooon, 2002

Her work is at the same time seductively cute, and strangely disturbing. No one can help to think that Erina Matsui is describing the suffering of Japanese new generations, using the now unmasking kawaii trend not only invading Japan and Japanese artists works, but also Europe and the United States (gothic Lolita fashion, illustrators like Adolie Day, Lost Fish, Candy Bird, Krista Huot).

Heavenly Creatures, 2005

Erina Matsui is exhibiting with other artists at No Man's Land exhibition, at the French Ambassy former building in Tokyo, Hiro-O, until January, 31rst, 2010.

MORI GIRL - TOKYO HARAJUKU FASHION - THE LATEST HOT STREET FASHION

Sunday, December 19, 2009

« 森ガール »って言うのは、何？»

“Forest Girls, what is this?”

All pictures are taken from Spoon, Mori Girl Papier and Fudge magazines.

Is this just a trend or a real phenomenon? Tokyo has seen a new and apparently powerful fashion appeared, two years ago if we go back to its origins, but only really appearing since last spring and definitely acquired this last autumn.

If it's true the Mori Girl fashion appeared about 3 years and a half ago and that Fur Fur (brand based on the Mori Girls concept) exists for 3 or 4 years and made an impression in the fall 2008 on podiums, the Mori Girl style is now better recognized and has its voice (or even voices).

To make it simple, Mori Girl (Forest girl) fashion describes a “girl who looks like living in the Forest”. The origin of the name « Mori Girl » that became some kind of label was launched by Choco, the moderator of the Mixi (Japanese social network, as Myspace, Facebook…) Mori Girl group (that counted this summer about 8 000 members) after she has been said by one of her friend « you look like a girl in the forest”.If it appears that Mori Girls are noticeable in Harajuku, their shopping customs are mostly in shops selling antiques and second hand clothes, in the neighborhoods of Kouenji, Shimokitazawa or Daikanyama, as they cultivate a special taste for antiques.

Roughly, the silhouette of a Mori Girl could be described by wearing a loose pleated “one-piece”, tights or leggings, low-heeled round toes shoes. Their special characteristic of accumulating layers of clothes (one-piece, cardigan, scarf, turtle neck…) to drape the body is very common, and has been made to hide the body lines. It might be some kind of answer to the too sexy way to dress of Shibuya Kei (Shibuya belonging group).

They prefer natural colors and earth colors like beige, white, dark green, dark blue, dark red. They prefer cotton and natural materials, and even if they wear chemical fibers, they try to limit this custom. It seems that wearing cotton and natural fibers helps to acquire the natural loose and soft silhouette, and to keep a lively and fresh look. They like fur, fluffy hats, knitwears, small gold things rather than silver, antique watches, frills, floral retro patterns and animal motifs, leather bags, basic turtleneck, puff-sleeves, blouses, antique keys, rosarios…

Their make-up, hair and nails also must look natural: they are pale skin complexion, don’t use a heavy make-up, only cheeks are two big pink round shapes, they have short nails, the hair is usually loose, or loosed permed hair with a straight fringe.

Even if in some way, we could say that they borrow codes from natural kei (brands like Bulle de Savon) for natural materials, yurukaji kei (Gomme) for draped style or even lolita kei (Jane Marple) for frills and round toes shoes, they shouldn’t be taken for belonging to any of these groups.

Rumors say that to be called a Mori Girl, one’s should respect at least 60 rules (that I will soon talk about in a new post). The 60 rules actually seem to appear to consist in 40 base rules, 4 warnings and 22 other rules about something even more obscure, and that are, to my point of view, no more about fashion, no more about customs, but some rules to keep a group compact and closed (as Japanese culture knows to do so well).

The style started to appear in magazines very recently. Spoon edited a first Mori Girls dedicated magazine in March 2009, “Mori Girl A to Z” and the first volume of the Mori Girls magazine, Mori Girl Papier went out at the end of November. Fudge magazine also welcomes the movement by offering each month more fashion reports about Mori Girls. Spoon magazine chose the actress Yu Aoi as the perfect incarnation of the Mori Girl ; as Mori Girl magazine chose to interview the singer Meg (that appeared in Japan Expo 2009 edition for a show with Laforet Harajuku).

We can say, after we had an overview, that this fashion is becoming a phenomenon. As it was pretty obscure before, nothing in English has been posted for more than 6 months - and you won’t even find much more than what I’m saying in that post - now that magazines like Fudge, Spoon and Mori Girl Papier are talking about the movement we will have a better understanding of that fashion.

Mori Girl is not a simple trend anymore. And as it plays on the natural grounds, it plays also on the analog ones. The Mori Girl fashion could also be interesting on a social point of view, because it’s not only about style but also about acts and customs.

We can also notice a special dedicated blog (in Japanese) 森ガール and a list of books and magazines to be found on Amazon Japan.

I will investigate more on the phenomenom, and soon talk about the Mori Girl "60 points" and list some of their favorite brands.

CHANTILLY - LOLITA TOKYO HARAJUKU FASHION - A SHORT INTRODUCTION TO THE BRAND

Saturday, december 19, 2009

Chantilly is a brand from Tokyo Harajuku lolita fashion. Fumiko, Chantilly's designer and owner, previously worked for the Lolita brand Baby, the Stars Shine Bright as a pattern designer and also worked for Angelic Pretty. After she joined Atelier Pierrot and worked for them for about one year, she became totally independent with her brand, Chantilly; Fumiko kept good relations with Atelier Pierrot and sells her creations at their select shop at the department store Laforet Harajuku.

Chantilly's design is closer to the classic lolita style, exploring a range of classical colors like black, white, dark red, dark green, dark blue. Fumiko simply explains: “Kamikaze Girl candy pink is fun, but I find it a bit caricatured”.

Chantilly first appeared in France in 2007, at the fashion show organized by Laforet Harajuku during Japan Expo exhibition, with other brands such as Algonquins, Black Peace Now, Baby the Stars Shine Bright, Angelic Pretty, Alice and the Pirates, Metamorphose temps de fille, Putumayo, Sexy Dynamite London, Super Lovers, Stigmata and Casper John.

Trivia
Chantilly’s designer, Fumiko, is close to Sachi from Kokusyoku Sumire.
She also knows the vocal of the visual kei band Xodiack.
Fumiko made an apparition in the movie Kamikaze Girl, when the character of Kyoko Fukada, Momoko, visits Baby, the Stars Shine Bright manufacture.

More on Chantilly
Chantilly and Sachi from Kokusyoku Sumire photo shooting
Chantilly first photo shooting
Official Chantilly Website (in Japanese)

FREAKS, BY TOD BROWNING : MY FIRST INTRODUCTION TO SUBCULTURES

Friday, November 11, 2009

If a blog is also to talk about you, so people can know more about your life and maybe understand you better, then I thought I have really to start to talk about my inspirations.

As far as I can go back in time, regarding my underground background and, here, my taste for gothic, then there is always one reference that crosses my mind at first, a movie by Tod Browning, a cinema master piece: Freaks. It’s not new, I know, and a lot of people might have this reference, but the explanation is simply that probably, Freaks, was one of the first movie with a gothic background. Of course, some people will tell me about Nosferatu, from Friedrich W. Murnau, that must be a classic, but even though I appreciate Nosferatu, its light (mostly), music and sets, it didn’t bring me the echoes on the background that Freaks was attempting, and actually managed, to give. Freaks, the word is clear. Around the world of a small circus exhibiting human with disability, Todd Browning revealed a human freaks crowd much more human than the so called-ones.

Here I am. I remember, from my childhood, I always felt to be apart. And still I feel, I’m the outsider. But in one way, being put apart made me underground ; but the irony is that sometimes even underground people put me apart...

Here I am. I might be 5 or 6 years old at that time. I’ve never been an easy going to bed child. There were always tones of strange stories I wanted to hear. My mom was getting bored, I must admit. So I was fainting to go to bed, and wait quietly. After my parents would have gone to sleep, and once I made sure, they would have fallen deep in their dreams, I was snicking into the living room, getting closer to the television, and watch my favorite show, on Sundays, around midnight, le Cinéma de minuit.

And, it’s there, sitting from 3 feet and some from the screen that probably I had a revelation about what is gothic, what is monster, what is human, what is outsider... I don’t know if you can explain that a child can understand already those concepts, and be attracted by a movie with such monsters.

When the movie went out in 1932, it didn’t make a hit, and actually was negatively received by audiences, and remained an object of extreme controversy. And even if the movie disappeared for 30 years, when he appeared again, it became one of the references of the counterculture cult movies.

And, probably, this is how, very young already, I’ve been attracted by underground.

REEM ALASADI : INTERVIEW WITH A TOP DESIGNER FROM UK

Thursday, December 12, 2009

Reem Alasadi, who is certainly much solicited, accepted to answer to a one hour interview, yesterday, at her exhibition store in Laforet Harajuku.

Reem is certainly one of the strongest women I’ve ever met, very powerful, who sticks strongly to her ideas and made ecology, ethnical, elegant, punk and underground fit in a same concept for beauty.

Reem Alsadi at Tokyo Fashion Week 2009