by Ben PERDUE

Iris van Herpen twists leather and metal into a beautiful state of submission. Holed up in Arnhem where she graduated from the ArtEZ Academy of Art and Design in 2006, the 24-yr-old womenswear designer is fast becoming an Amsterdam Fashion Week highlight. Her acclaimed collections have a multi-dimensional depth that combines architectural severity with ethereal movement. Emphasis she places on painstakingly handcrafted details and sharply sculpted silhouettes further enhancing her ultra-modern aesthetic. “A photographer told me not so long ago that seeing my catwalk shows opened his mind to a new way of looking at things,” say van Herpen. “He had never seen anything else he could compare them to.”

The 3D structures that van Herpen constructs around the female form are reliant upon the versatile qualities of the unexpected materials she embraces. Tough textiles like the wire gauze, copper hair and leather strapping that feature heavily in her work. “I fell in love with leather the first time I used it,” she says. “It has more power and personality than any fabric. It’s timeless but it can be misrepresented in the fashion industry – restricted to being either sexy or tough. Leather can be feminine without being linked to sex. Metal is a challenge to work with but perfect for creating structure and adding some industrial edge.”

Showpieces like the heavily studded biker jacket-inspired mini-dress for autumn/winter 2009/10, with its armour-like conical shoulders, elegantly harness the hefty impact of leather and hardware. This deceptive balance of robustness and organic design resonates through the collection. Decorative details like flowing ruffles and delicate fringing are rethought using leather and chains instead of lace and silk, forcing the viewer to question the relationship between hard and soft. Cocooning leather-bound bodysuits and dramatic hooded dresses sound heavy and cumbersome on paper but emerge lightweight and airy on the catwalk. Fitting tribute to the laborious handwork and expert craftsmanship poured into every couture-like creation. “I never count the hours, days and weeks that go into each one,’ says van Herpen. “Some took more than a month to make with four people working on them at the same time.”

Whether her models are encased in futurist hand-woven suits and exoskeleton-like bodices, or industrial halter-neck cocktail dresses, a spiritual lightness of movement remains constant. Fittingly the body-con leather binding, sophisticated strapping and intricate lacing that dominated the latest collection were influenced by ancient preparations for the afterlife. “I was inspired by the mummification techniques of the Egyptians and their concept of creating a new reality through art,” says van Herpen. “They considered the reality created for their deaths as an actual reality. Their daily life was just an illusion. It’s an interesting way of approaching life. We all have our own idea of what reality is. We created it so we can play with it and disturb it. The Egyptians did that by creating a reality for the dead. I do that by creating a reality in my collections, so I used some elements of mummification. I was amazed by the handwork, detail and craftsmanship that went into it. It was the ultimate ‘ugly to beautiful’ extreme makeover.”

The latest collection is brazenly leather-heavy but any parallels with fetish subculture are purely in the eyes of the beholder. Just as her preoccupation with enhancing the female form has nothing to do with sex appeal. “If I make something out of black leather with metal details people will automatically associate it with sex. No matter how organic, free-formed or romantic the design is,” says van Herpen. “Some see fetish and some see romance. But what people see says more about themselves than it does about my work.”

Spanning a career that has lasted 30 years and credited as the pioneers of Electro Punk, EBM and Techno, Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft have stayed true to their initial approach and always stuck to the dark German underground from where they emerged. In conversation with one half of the duo – Robert Görl…

1. To mark your 30-year jubilee you reformed and toured again. I saw you live in London and felt that you still hit the zeitgeist just as much today. How do you see your own development, the scene’s and above all the music’s over the past three decades?

That we still hit the zeitgeist is of course flattering, I think it has something to do with our knack for originality and our pioneering work. It is often said that we were ahead of our time – that our style of music was copied by other bands – and even when imitated it was successful. We have never had anything to do with the general development of music, we stand for ourselves and that’s enough for us! 

2. The end of the 70’s, Punk, the beginnings of early electronic music. How did this evolve at the time, the fusion of guitars and electro? Did bands such as Kraftwerk play a role?

With Punk everything changed! Nobody wanted 70’s music anymore – it was not only the style of the music – also harder lyrics – this is what we liked! Kraftwerk was too harmless for us. We were into the Sex Pistols, but we didn’t want guitars anymore – we preferred the electronic. Electronic with live drums, so more or less EBM. I also have a weakness for good Pop music.

3.  Düsseldorf and Berlin were two German cities, which emanated immense musical creativity during this time. What do you think were the reasons for this and how did this develop over the years, from Punk to Industrial and later into Techno, especially within the scene that you were a part of? I ask this question because I come from Düsseldorf and have lived in Berlin and today see very little of what was once created there.

As I said before the reason for this was definitely Punk. At the same time there was also an uprising in the art world, “die Jungen Wilden” (“the wild youth”) and they were also into Punk, for example Beuys or Immendorff! Of course everything has moved on – today the majority of these kinds of people have adjusted, they are not wild and less creative! But in time this will also change again.

4. The Ratinger Hof, the SO36, today they are well-known but what did these venues stand for at the time? I went to Techno parties at the Ratinger Hof when I was a teenager. What I’m interested in is the scene at the end of the 70’s, beginning of the 80’s, and how it developed later, musically as well as socially.

We were always at the Ratinger Hof – that joint was like my second home. At the time I was essentially there every day – and it was in the damp cellar of that place that Gabi and I founded DAF.

5. “Du bist jung und Du bist stark, Nimm dir was du willst, Verschwende deine Jugend” (“You are young and you are strong, Take what you want, Waste your youth”). If the scene is looked at as a sub cultural movement, what did this track or rather the statement mean to you at the time?

This track is an absolute youth track – and we wanted youth to be lived out to the extreme or basically to be wasted!

6. What is the biggest misinterpretation about DAF? And how was DAF rightly or wrongly received in terms of fascist connotations?

That the media tried to pigeonhole DAF into the fascist corner never bothered us! We just thought it was strange how stupid the media were!

7.  What was your experience of leaving Germany and moving to Mute Records in the UK, and your collaboration with Daniel Miller?

England was a big adventure for us – we went there without any money. We had this idea that our music would be viewed in a better or more neutral way there, and this was the case. The British Media loved us a lot – that’s no exaggeration. D. Miller more or less discovered us on the street and really wanted to produce our music.

8. Did you suddenly feel a bit naked or exposed alone as just the two of you? How did you approach this minimal presence, this new appearance?

As a duo, Gabi and I found our vocation – the fact that there were five of us at the beginning, then four was of developmental importance, but no more than that. Gabi and I worked towards the realisation of us a duo from the first minute we founded DAF. The very first DAF rehearsal was also as a DUO – in the cellar of the Ratinger Hof.

9. What was your relationship with the other bands at the time, for example Liaisons Dangereuses, Mania D and the local Punk bands? What or who inspired you then, and today?

We hardly had any contact with other bands, we were much too busy with our own music. Of course we new Malaria, Liaisons Dangereuses and a lot of the others. Inspiring for us was the Punk movement, however we had our own ideas about how we wanted to sound – unlike many Punk bands we were interested in synthesizers and not guitars, even if we initially had a guitarist. Even today it’s like this – I can only be creative when I concentrate fully on myself and not on others. Our main focus has always been originality, things that already exist are not our thing.

10. What is your take on the music scene nowadays, do you think that subcultures exist in the same way?

The music scene today is as it always has been, beaten down by commercial music formats – I have the feeling now more than ever. Since when has the subculture had it easy? The club landscape will always be the home of the subculture. Thankfully!
 

Body Snatcher

It’s the morning after a night before that involved six hours of wine tasting at the bar down the road where she works and Gemma Slack is feeling it. “As if I know what a vanilla bouquet is,” groans the 23-yr-old womenswear designer, staring into her black coffee as we sit down to talk at The Old Shoreditch Station. But if Slack is hung over you could never guess. Her raven crop, slashed black eyeliner, alabaster skin and wide smile framed in vivid red lipstick tell a different story.

Raised in Pitsmoor, an area she describes as “like the Brixton of Sheffield,” Gemma Slack moved south to do a foundation year in fine art at the Chelsea College of Art and Design. Her sculptural fixation with the human form emerged early on and when a tutor introduced the idea of swapping to fashion for her degree course, she applied to the London College of Fashion to study womenswear. “I was told you don’t just have to make pretty dresses and jeans,” she says. “So I went there and couldn’t sew, couldn’t pattern cut or anything. How the hell I got on the course I don’t know. My portfolio of work was stapled together at the back instead of stitched. Fashion had always been on my radar so it was a natural progression for me. I just never though of it as a job I could do.”

The body is a constant theme in her work, inspiring both silhouette and materials. From the armour-like spine and ribcage protection in the most recent collection to the flowing human hair shoulder pieces in her debut show. An obsession with tough physiological structures like muscle and bone that compliments her love of leathers and hardware – if not her vegetarianism. But then she manages to live above a butcher’s shop in Dalston. “I had one person stand in front of me wearing a full fur coat tell me that using human hair was repulsive,” say Slack. “I would never use fur, or even synthetic fur. Leather is different, I fell in love with leather years ago and no other material can be manipulated in the same way. But hair is a waste product. We cut it and throw it away. Another person said it made them feel sick. It amazes people have such a strong reaction. I never set out to achieve that but I like it. I just wanted to harness the way hair moves as a material.”

For her autumn/winter 2009/10 show Slack looked to the overlap of science and religion for inspiration. Building her racy aesthetic on the concept of protection as something symbolic rather functional. Encasing the models in zipped leather micro dresses with articulated back plates, body-con all-in-ones with taped smoke print panels, padded sci-fi leather gilets and BDSM-inspired face masks. Clinging modern fabrics offset with rough-hewn leather showpieces and heavy metal hardware. Monochrome shades and natural flesh tones dominated the colour palette. “Hardcore fetishists would look at it and think it was too floaty,” says Slack. “But it’s more about empowerment and maybe my own fetishes to do with leather. Sex is a natural part of everything. It’s about being sexy for you. That’s the most attractive thing anyway.”

Despite the hangover Slack is looking forward to working at the bar again later. She enjoys learning new techniques at home, getting on with her new collection and hanging out in Dalston’s hair shops coveting the wigs. Her only concession to thoughts of fame is hoping to see Siouxsie Soux or Marilyn Manson wear her clothes. In the meantime she’ll make do with celebrity endorsement in the form of Roisin Murphy. Spotted wearing the infamous hair-shouldered jacket at London Fashion Week. “That picture was really good,” laughs Slack. ‘And it’s probably the only opportunity I’ll ever have to get into Heat magazine.”

Ben PERDUE

“People think I do millinery but I’m shit at making hats,” says hairdresser Charlie Le Mindu, clearing himself a space amongst the magazines, brushes and discarded cans of product littering the sofa in his cramped Shoreditch salon. “I don’t want to be known as a designer. I make wigs.” Whichever way you look at, it the puckish 22-yr-old has carved out a living by cutting hair. Whether it’s attached to the heads it came from still or not.

His 5 o’clock client passed me on the stairs and we have a free slot before the next punter buzzes up from the street. So I get the grand tour. “You know Gemma Slack? She used to live in here,” says Le Mindu, opening the door to a single room with a mattress and some bin bags. The only clues his designer friend had ever been there. And that’s the tour over. Le Mindu lives in the tiny flat above, which is in a shit state too he confesses. You come here for a haircut, not to admire the interior décor.

With a client base built on word of mouth, Charlie Le Mindu had a strictly underground following until he showed a collection of wigs for autumn/winter 2009/10. An insane combination of unworldly creations that ranged from skull-topped cascades of curls and fountain-like deconstructed beehives, to towering drapes of vermillion fringing and rat skin headpieces. Not that his skills were previously underrated. His regulars are as likely to come from Knightsbridge as Shoreditch. Ladies who lunch and club freaks alike. “I don’t like cool kids. I like interesting people,” he says, combing a hand through his peroxide blonde shock of wavy hair. “I’m like a gypsy. I can work anywhere. I’m not tied down to any particular style.”

This transient edge developed after Le Mindu moved from his hometown of Bordeaux to Berlin. Using skills perfected over seven years of study for a formal hairdressing diploma back in France, he opened regular pop up salons at club parties. “The nightlife is great there, much better than London. I met Peaches at one of my pop up salons and now I do her hair. Everything started form there. But after three years in Berlin I couldn’t party anymore so I moved to London to concentrate on work.” Which has grown into a career that spans styling at shoots and fashion shows, touring with Berlin hell-raiser Peaches as her official hairdresser, and making show-stopping shaggy sculptures masquerading as wigs.

Le Mindu admits that he was in a “fucking dark mood” when he created his latest collection but while he never set out to shock, one piece in particular has polarised opinions of his work. A wig covering the head like a ski mask, stitched out of whole rat pelts. “After I showed it, PETA called me up and were like, ‘what do you think you’re doing?’” laughs Le Mindu. “‘What if you used baby skins?’ I told the girl on the phone that next time I’d be using her vagina to make earrings instead. She hung up. They’re like fascists. I wish they had threatened me properly. That would have been even funnier.” But joking aside, if Le Mindu could use human products like skin, bones and teeth he would. “I like everything that relates to the body. If I could use human skin to make clothes they would be amazing. I love all skins, not just the usual animals and fish. I think I have a different view of sexiness than everyone else. I like things a bit mental.”

Next season promises to be a happier affair with Le Mindu planning wigs for other parts of the body this time too. So PETA activists beware because merkins look set to make a catwalk comeback. His work may not be for the easily offended but Le Mindu does have a positive message. “Wigs aren’t only for people with cancer and drag queens,” he says. “I just want to show people that everything they thought was ugly can be beautiful.”

Ben PERDUE

Article by SB contributor and globe-trotting friend Clément Delépine

From The Box gallery in Los Angeles to the Whitney Museum in New York, which both hosted exhibitions related to the work of filmmaker Stan Vanderbeek (1927-1984), it seems that the Spring 2009 aspired to question the birth of experimental video.

Made up with series of drawings and collages, Vanderbeek’s films took him into a much-heralded new creative dimension, and legitimately  became a source of inspiration for directors like Terry Gilliam. Practically entirely handmade (which is fairly impressive for those who like me are the clumsiness incarnate) truly mesmerizing and a bit melancolic, Vanderbeek’s visionary works challenged the very idea of filmmaking and production. His countless collaborations (notably with the artist Claes Oldenburg or the choreographer Merce Cunningham) command respect. Touched by grace, he initiated a turning point in the history of visual arts as he was also among the firsts to team up with engineers in order to produce computer-generated images.

As an artist, Vanderbeek was persuaded that his function was to invent a universal language as “It is imperative that we quickly find some way for the entire level of world human understanding to rise to a new human scale. The scale is the world”.

(also see “first lines“)

I just can’t get enough.
I just can’t get enough.

Text by Jennifer Chesler, Photography by Cheong Kwon


Mandi, one of the girls at the club, she puts on her wig and starts moving on the stage, stumbling left and right, right and left. She dances like her legs are about to go out from under her, lies on the ground with her legs spread, plump and round. Her cracks are wet; you can see it, slick-like down the middle, and a dildo she holds in one hand. She puts it down on the ground, and she starts going down, working that dick in and out of her pussy, fucking crazy, that bitch. There isn’t even any lube on the goddamn thing. I get a hot flash, a wet spot in my pants, watching her. What the fuck, I say, what the fuck? But she keeps going, chains on her wrists, big cock stuck up her cunt, music playing like you wouldn’t believe. Shine it closer, I say, shine up the — the spotlight hits her right in the eyes. I know she can’t see shit; I take a $50 bill and stick it in her twat, like a billfold. Hateful, I was hateful. She doesn’t see how much I give her, but I give it to her anyway, don’t even tell her it’s from me, just wait for her to crawl in my direction, and then I slide it in there. When the spotlight moves to her tits, they’re big as balls, I tell you, big as motherfucking balls, rolling down her chest like a mother.