The Women, the Fashion, the Gender
Roles and Their Lovers Austrian Cultural Forum Zagreb,
Croatia, 2024-2025 Created on the occasion of "Misli
Modu/Think Fashion", a joint project of the network of European
national cultural institutes and state institutions - EUNIC Croatia
and first exhibited in the Vukovar Municipal Museum, Croatia, 2022
Isn't the stage actually a catwalk? (The female roles and their expression
through fashion, taken very seriously and lovingly ironic) Veronika Tzekova
“All the world's a stage, / And all
the men and women merely players....” says Shakespeare's Jacques
and I would add: and all of them wear costumes. Costumes to denote
status, to protect, to call for attention, to impress and seduce, to
impersonate, to camouflage oneself, to make a difference, to make a
statement. Fashion is a fascinating world, a
complex system of rules, dogmas and cliches, monstrous industry and
in the same time overpopulated playground full of fantasies, rules
breaking, freedom of self-expression and aesthetic indulgence. A
fertile soil for an artist to get inspired. I took on a bunch of key
entries from the fashion vocabulary, which are strongly related to
social notions and concepts. The resulting three artworks deconstruct
and reassemble visually both, the written language and the language
of fashion. "ŽENE" is literally a list
of past participles in Croatian. The past participle describes a noun
that does not do the action, but endures it. Each of the words in the
list ends in “žene” (en. women) but is not written all the way
through. "ŽENE" appears once at the end, in capital
letters and with a font size that is several times larger. The list
of actions performed is long, but the object is only one, the women.
A laconic but visually dominant presence, at the end of the lengthy
list of actions they are subjected to. The list is metaphorical,
excessive, perhaps ironic, perhaps self-ironic, unrealistic,
realistic, with a touch of absurdity, like life itself, but only for
the purpose of creating and imposing the painful, even paralysing
sense of being the object of innumerable expectations, desires,
definitions..., to have to step into innumerable roles, to meet
innumerable demands, to satisfy innumerable needs, ..., only because
you are a woman, expressed and exposed (izraŽENA i izloŽENA),
wanted and blissful (traŽENA and blaŽENA) … "ŽENE"
looks at the language through the lens of set theory and uses the
visual perception of written text. "ŽENE" consists of
constellations of micro-scenarios of two words, which, however, tell
multiple stories and describe countless female destinies, trying to
create a multifaceted image of women as an object. Female roles, consciously chosen or
imposed from outside, often have an associated fashion statement
piece. “The double burden outfit” consists of five fashion
statement garment pieces: a trouser suit, a housewife apron, a
designer tote bag, Borosana shoes (original ready-made), all in the
Borovo shoe factory signature “Pivce za živce” patterned
textile. This compound of soft sculptures is a fashion metaphor for
the multiple burden women are caring. It is socially critical and at
the same time it celebrates self-irony. Women wore the trouser suits
as to destroy gender norms, as an act of rebellion and
self-liberation, a symbol for emancipation and empowerment, but the
majority somehow forgot to “take off the housewife aprons” and
keeps doing the second shift. The apron-wearing female, the aproned
wife and mother are complex symbols of status, oppression, feminine
domesticity and household work. The women fought and got new rights,
which slowly turned into obligations and still continue to “wear
the apron”. It’s no secret that professional
working women need a handbag that is dependable, stylish, and built
to carry everything they need when they need it, be it a laptop,
extra pair of shoes, cosmetic bag or baby diapering accessories.
There is always a place in it for the grocery essentials, shopped on
the way home after work. Always prepared to step in a role, always
prepared to face the challenge the situation brings. And the shoes, the shoes are of course,
“Borosana”. The shoes for the working woman, from the nurse, the
hairdresser to the shoemaker. All this multifaceted existence
inevitably needs a balancing act. And here comes the right camouflage
for the emancipated women surfing through life of multiple burden and
switching from role to role, of course, “beers for the nerves”
(“Pivce za živce”). “feMINIsm”, the third art piece,
partly camouflaged in zebra animal print wanders in the jungle of
feminism. Deconstructs it mercilessly, purely mechanically and brings
it to a larger semantic level. Offers a playground for thoughts on
feminism and yet gives a feeling that after all these years, we the
men and women of today got lost in the social theatre and admit it,
we do not know what is feminism today and how it is dressed. For sure
it does not wear and uniform and among others it contains iron, wears
a mini and is complemented with SM. Fe is the chemical element with
number 26, but is the iron lady a superhero or a villain? The mini
(skirt), as a political act, act of seduction or a male fantasy? SM,
for Sado-Masochism, Social Media, Super-Model or all together and
more? And just like the animal print, feminism still has
controversial reputation and can be often encountered accompanied by
classifications like hot, witty, bold, brave and exotic, but not less
often is being stamped as tacky and inappropriate.
The stage is actually a catwalk,
saturated with forms and contents, where queens and kings are
definitely not naked! |
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