Scissors + Paper Rock! will be taking a break for the Australian summer holidays, and for my last post this year I'm more than just a bit excited to feature a very special paper find from the wonderful Paper book. This is one of my very favourite paper fashion stories... one of those moments that you read about and soooo wish you'd seen in person...
The work above was an entire fashion show by Brazilian designer Jum Nakao during the San Paulo Fashion Week in 2004... and every single outfit is made of paper. The 'A Costura do Invisivel' (Sewing the Invisible) exhibition was an absolute sensation at the time because, at the end of the show, the models tore off every outfit leaving a mass of destroyed paper dresses on the catwalk... shredded outfits that had taken 180 days to make by a team of 150 people! [Definite *gasp* factor!] So, why would someone do such a thing? Well, this is what Jum Nakao had to say in an interview at Ping Mag...
"All of my works, for example the paper-made “A costura do invisivel” fashion line , have a playful relationship with the spectator. This lightness is necessary to get a distance from reality and a connection with the invisible, with people’s imagination, to let them see it from a different perspective - a less realistic one. These works lack concreteness and a clearly defined form, which would not allow the spectator’s personal interpretation. I see them more as an interface, so whoever looks at them participates and is able to find its own meanings."
The incredible detail and effort that went into each garment is just breathtaking. Nakao selected a vegetable-fibre paper which gave a slight transparency to the outfits, which were embossed and laser-cut into lacework patterns... all of which combined to form an ethereal fairytale feel to the collection. It has a definite *sigh* factor too, particularly as these pieces are now gone I presume, or at least not in their complete form... but maybe that's part of Nakao's fun? We can still look at these photos and imagine making our own or twirling them around in our imaginations?
Jum Nakao's website can be found here. There is a blog here and a YouTube feature of the fashion show here.
Thanks so much for your support in what has been a wonderful first year of blogging for me. See you next year :)
