StyleZeitgeist Podcast: Why Speaking Up Matters with James Scully

Culture, Fashion

We speak with the casting director James Scully about his trajectory of working in fashion, from his days at the iconic New York boutique Charivari in the ‘80s to his days at Harper’s Bazaar and the changes he witnessed while being there, to becoming one of the best casting agents in the fashion industry; his whistle blowing on the rampant abuse of models and the changes it engendered. James’s is a brilliant story of working his way up in fashion through sheer love of it and his talent. It is also an important one because it provides a rare glimpse of what goes on under the hood of the fashion industry.

Katsuya Kamo at Omotesando Hills in Tokyo

Culture

Katsuya Kamo was a brilliant artist who created what he called “head sculptures” for runway shows for Junya Watanabe, Jun Takahashi’s Undercover, and Anrealage. He also occasionally worked with Chanel and Haider Ackermann. You have seen his iconic pieces that contributed to the overall image and runway awe of those brands even if you did not know Kamo’s name.

Masahisa Fukase at TOP Museum Tokyo

Culture

Every art form has a notion of a cult work, that is something that is not widely known but develops a following, often amongst the cognoscenti. As I was developing my interest in photography, one of the first cult works recommended to me was a book called The Solitude of Ravens by the Japanese photographer Masahisa Fukase. Around 2008 I snagged one online for thirty bucks or so, just before they went up in price tenfold. Without knowing anything about Fukase, the Ravens series immediately drew me in with its arresting depiction of the forlornness of nature via the birds in the title. I felt their pull anew on my recent visit to Japan – somehow on this trip I kept noticing ravens every day.

Hiroshi Sugimoto’s Enoura Observatory

Culture

One begins to acquire a new level of understanding of Hiroshi Sugimoto’s work – especially his seascape series – as the train gets closer to Odawara, where his art foundation is situated, crowned by the Enoura Observatory, Sugimoto’s architectural project that opened in 2017 after more than twenty years of planning. It helps if it rains, as it did on the day I visited, which makes the water of the Sagami Bay and its bordering sky look like two sheets of gray steel that meet at slightly different angles. “Sorry for the weather but Sugimoto prefers a rainy day, because the stones are very beautiful under the rain,” wrote his press office as I mulled changing the day of my visit. But of course he does. The rain highlights the specific melancholy beauty that comes out when you pay attention to the minute details of nature and of man’s respectful interference with it. There is a lot of such beauty in Japan, and though cliches like “wabi sabi” and “Japanese esthetics” are hard to avoid, this specific beauty, one that whispers and demands contemplation and slowing down and paying attention remains unmatched in its subtlety. Read Junichiro Tanizaki’s quiet masterpiece In Praise of Shadows, and you will understand.

StyleZeitgeist Podcast: The Apology by Demna with Amy Odell

Culture, Fashion

We dissect Demna’s first post-Balenciaga scandal interview in Vogue with the journalist Amy Odell. We discuss Demna’s mea culpas and the various statements he makes, dive into the mechanics of the interview, its possible causes and effects, Kering’s corporate strategy, and Vogue’s journalistic integrity. We also try to guess who actually conducted the interview. Odell…

Joseph Beuys: Four Books in a Box

Culture

We live in a sterile age. Nothing reminds one of this fact like the work of the German artist Joseph Beuys. It is anything but sterile – dirt, earth, organic matter were at its center. Beuys wallowed in the dirt – it was his connection to the planet we were busy ruining, as he liked to remind us.

A new book, or rather four books in a box, called Four Books in a Box, published by Steidl, and out today, reminds us of this message. Prosaically called, the compendium is anything but prosaic. As an object it is also earthy. There is not a hint of gloss in its sturdy case, fabric covers, and mostly black and white pages. As the hand passes over the pages, one feels its presence, its thingness, its physical presence in the physical universe.