fashion designers…preparing for the Oscars

What would the starlets do without the top designers on Oscar night?…and what would the designers do without historical fashion?  Designers are often influenced by articals of clothing, style, accessory or fabric from the past. For example; although I am not a fashion designer I did have fun designing and illustrating the Tux-Shrug below.  I rather liked the high-waisted bodice which came forth during the Renaissance period. One never knows what inspires one does one.

Pen and ink fashion design and illustration of front and back views of a Tux-Shrug by Sandra SantaLucia, Banff, AB/17/01/2012

You might like to read Ulinka Rublack's artical  "Renaissance Fashion: The Birth of Power Dressing," at Cambridge University. Ulinka Rublack makes a good argument that the concept as we know it got started way back in the 1300s. By the end of the era, "clothes already formed an important part of what we might call people’s ‘psychic landscapes.’ Wardrobes could become repositories of fantasies and insecurities, as well as reflecting expectations of what a person might look like and behave." Particularly interesting is her research on one Matthaus Schwarz, an Augsburg accountant who had watercolor paintings of himself in various outfits bound into a book—making him possibly the world's first fashion blogger.

This week's topic for Illustration Friday week of Jan. 14 - 20, 2012

This week's topic is "Prepare" suggested by Susan Sorrell Hill (http://susansorrellhill.wordpress.com/).

An artist must possess Nature. He must identify himself with her rhythm, by efforts that will prepare the mastery which will later enable him to express himself in his own language. ~ Henri Matisse