A rare personal statement on freedom, defiance and creativity from one of the world’s most respected and elusive designers
Ask anyone working in the fashion industry which designer they most admire, and chances are they will say Rei Kawakubo of Comme des Garçons. For AnOther Magazine 18 we asked some friends, including Stephen Jones, Nick Knight, Alexander McQueen and Björk, just what it is that makes the elusive designer such an unlikely figurehead for fashion. Here a rare written response from the lady herself is accompanied by images of the S/S10 Comme des Garçons collection shot by AnOther Magazine’s Fashion Director Cathy Edwards and photographer Lina Scheynius.
"The main pillar of my activity is making clothes, but this can never be the perfect and only vehicle of expression. I am always thinking of the total idea, and the context of everything. Fashion alone is so far from being the whole story. It seems that with fashion, as with art, things are getting easier in one sense, but at the same time it is getting harder to be stimulated about things or excite people. Without that impetus of creation, progress is not possible. All kinds of ways of expression are spreading out all over the place, information is overflowing, and it’s harder and harder to be excited about anything. In order to be stimulated or moved in the future, we probably have to go into space and look at our world from there.
What do I think is an unyielding spirit? It would be wonderful if everyone had it in equal measure. But it’s impossible. This defiant mentality can also be called the fight against absurdity and injustice and the power (authority) that thrives around it (that is rampant). One cannot fight the battle without freedom. I think the best way to fight that battle, which equals the unyielding spirit, is in the realm of creation. That’s exactly why freedom and the spirit of defiance is the source (fountainhead) of my energy."
