Kobiety, które budzą niepokój – kategoria fantastyki w działaniach kreatywnych Alexandra McQueena
Women Who Disturb Others—the Categories of the Fantastic in Creative Activities of Alexander McQueen

Author(s): Michał Wójciak
Subject(s): Theatre, Dance, Performing Arts, Fine Arts / Performing Arts, Sociology of Culture
Published by: Ośrodek Badawczy Facta Ficta
Keywords: fashion;haute couture;fantastic;magic realism;Alexander McQueen
Summary/Abstract: Michał Wójciak’s chapter is devoted to Alexander McQueen, considered one of the most important designers of the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. Thanks to his consistency in his work, McQueen gained a reputation as a visionary. His genius ability to break boundaries and to propel fashion closer to the category of art was validated in his exhibition, "Savage Beauty", organized in 2015 at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London. This was to be the first and largest European retrospective of McQueen’s work. BBC journalist Lindsay Baker once examined the work of British designer in the context of fairy tales written by the Brothers Grimm, which was the source of inspiration for McQueen. He designs silhouettes of warrior princesses and shapeshifters in his creative collections. Alexanders’ collections also make references to the past utilizing the aesthetics of the Victorian era horror. He envisioned the future through what he called the prism of the mythical Atlantis. This was to be Alexander McQueen’s final and complete collection which he named, “Plato’s Atlantis”. The untimely death and suicide of Alexander McQueen in 2010 ushered-in the end of an era in the fashion industry where many designers willingly created uncompromising, fantastical theatrical shows devoid of his creative vision and fashion genius.

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