Welcome to Eternally Ephemeral.
How is beauty defined & how do we capture it? These are questions worth exploring through fashion, fine art, friendships, film, & more. This is “Eternally Ephemeral”.
The nexus of this substack (or dare I – a proud Millennial – say a blog???) was when I walked through SCAD FASH’s new Balenciaga archival exhibition with just enough restraint not to touch each & every dress at the opening party in January. I left asking myself how do these pieces that were designed & created almost 80 years ago still have such a potent effect on us. I wove in & out of that question – testing different answers – just like a needle threading a garment.
It would have seemed connected & just completely on brand that I convinced Kevin (husband) that we should start “The New Look” – Apple TV’s latest period drama about the road to Dior’s first collection that heralded the same name as the show. How quickly I was engrossed should truly come as no surprise to those who know me.
See…the question of beauty & its permanence is something that – for the lack of a better word (or for the sake of honesty) – I am obsessed with to an almost Dorian Gray level. So that question has paid me so many visits over the years came back to me like it never left: How is beauty defined & how do we capture it?
In the show, we become well acquainted once again of the horrors of WWII – but this time through the lens of history’s fashion icons including Christian Dior, Gabrielle Chanel, Cristóbal Balenciaga, Pierre Balmain, Lucien Lelong, & more. The plot follows Christian & Coco most closely to show the parallels of how these two creative savants navigated Nazi-occupied France with fear becoming an ever-present ghost with each action & word. For Christian, the act of creating was survival – whether it was physical survival through disagreeably complying to accept dress commissions for Nazi wives, girlfriends, & mistresses or emotional wellbeing through bringing to life mesmerizing designs set against his perilous reality of his sister1 being held at a prisoners camp for the French Resistance. His act of finding beauty again & again no matter how challenging was the most audacious commitment. His own resistance.
As for Coco, her choices are much more complicated to dissect. Her decisions lead you on a mind boggling journey as a surrogate mother to her nephew who was also held in a prisoners camp, a Nazi sympathizer, an unmarried woman, an entrepreneur, an orphan, a fashion idol. But that’s another topic completely.
Tears welled in my eyes episode after episode knowing each scene was a mounting crescendo to Christian unveiling a collection with so much power that so many designers today have yet to capture. I think it’s because he designed with the sheer intensity of reminding himself that capturing beauty was still a worthwhile pursuit as a way to process the trauma he endured. I actually think of that meticulously tailored ivory blazer & black skirt on a daily basis – so simple, so poignant, so powerful.
Through the most haunted moments, through the darkest times, we grasp for beauty because it simply represents love & hope. Inarguably, these are the only virtues worth striving toward. As an abstract painter myself, I can attest that whether I am coming to my canvas with anger, sadness, confusion…the answer I search for ends with love & hope.
Being present amongst the opening night of the SCAD FASH Balenciaga exhibit was a necessary moment that reveling in beauty is deeply personal AND communal. I find my soul is at an odd ease when there is this unspoken acknowledgment with friends & strangers that witnessing someone’s own journey in creation mimics our desire to make sense of our genesis & subsequent life. Please take this as a directive to get a SCAD FASH membership because the value continues to surmount the $80/year membership fee. I get no commission from telling you to sign up except for the joy of knowing that more people will pull themselves out of the hamster wheel of social media & into the 3-D present. I have been back to see the exhibition three additional times – each visit teeming with more meaning than the last, especially since finishing “The New Look.”
I don’t know about you, but over the last couple of years, the world has seemed less like a friend & more like a monster. One that is waiting to see you quiver in the face of its wrath. The ongoing wars, the police brutality, the effects of inflation, the corrupt elections & elected officials, & social media’s toxicity, so on & so forth. These are not new happenings in the context of civilization, but thanks to social media, they are menacing truths we are constantly assaulted with. The need to reach for beauty continues to prevail. I not only want to…but NEED to…entertain those intrusive thoughts of reaching to touch an archival Balenciaga dress just to imagine what craftsmanship & intention to beauty that only a few still commit to feels like.
Which leads me back to our initial question plus some. What is beauty, how do we capture it, & for whom does it matter?
When we create for ourselves the paradox is that it speaks to so many, but when you create for everyone else, you end up losing yourself.
I’m not sure what the cadence of this newsletter will be – hopefully bi-weekly – but I will promise you this: I will never stop honoring the beauty that moves me for it is both eternal & ephemeral. That is worth understanding.
Catherine Dior does survive being imprisoned thanks to the allies liberating the camps. Christian names his first perfume after her…Miss Dior.