Hallowe'en

Phenakistoscope - Joseph Plateau

E A Seguy: Butterflies Through Others Eyes #13

These beautiful butterfly designs are the work of E A (Eugene Alain) Seguy (1889-1985), who was a designer working in France at the beginning of the 20th century. Seguy's style incorporated elements of both the Art Nouveau and Art Deco movements, which you will know I am a big fan of if you regularly read this blog. 

Seguy's artwork utilised a technique known as pochoir, which was a printing process that used a series of stencils to produce dense layers of vivid colour. The pochoir process sees the artist/designer applying pigment to paper by using stencils. The image was first created by the artist in watercolour or gouache. This would then determine the number of colours and stencils needed. Once the number of stencils was decided they would be cut from materials such as copper, zinc or cardboard and the paint would be applied through the stencil by brushes. Although it is a simple concept, the pochoir technique could be complex with some images requiring as many as 100 stencils to produce just one print. The pochoir technique fell out of fashion due to the expense, as well as labour intensity in producing the prints. The pochoir technique was replaced by the popularity of the lithographic process. 

The repeat pattern designs above, demonstrate the vibrancy of Seguy's palette, and also the vividness and accuracy of colours produced when the pochoir technique was employed. They are also a good demonstration of Seguy's understanding of how repeat patterns work. Like Sonia Delauney's work in my previous post, I could see these used as wallpaper/fabric/fashion designs. Seguy took his inspiration from nature and produced 11 albums of  illustrations and textile pattern designs that featured crystals, flowers and animals. It was his Papillon album though, which was to become the most popular and the focus for this post, the latest in my Butterflies Through Others Eyes series. Further examples from Seguy's wonderfully inspirational Papillons folio can be seen below.

Homage a Sonia Delauney

My visit to the Sonia Delauney exhibition at Tate Modern earlier this year (here), was very inspirational. As much as I loved the colour and rhythm of her paintings, it was her work in typography/graphics and fashion and textiles that I liked the most. 

I really do feel that her relocation to Spain at the onset of the First World War, and her having to adapt and apply her work to the fields of fashion and textiles, for financial reasons was actually the making of her. 

                                       

I did some research and looked at the impact that her work in fashion and textiles had on other designers in this field and these are the results.  

A Delauney simultaneous textile design scarf for Liberty's (above).

Delauney's black and white textile designs (above), could be seen as forerunners of Op-art and Bridget Riley's work from the 1960s. I love the way Christian La Croix has fractured his similar monochromatic Riviera design further (below), and given it a kaleidoscopic effect.

How fantastic are these embroidered shoes! It was great to see the actual things in the Delauney exhibition at Tate Modern.

This photograph is from Italian Vogue 1969. I do not know who the designer of the fabrics and clothes are but Delauney's influence is clearly all over it.

A 1923 Delauney fashion sketch with a Celine jumper from their AW 2010 collection.

A coat from Celine's AW 2012 collection compared with a 1925 Delauney design.

Striking patterns  from Ferragamo's AW 2015 collection which could be a Delauney simultaneous designs.

More Ferragamo for AW15 compared to Delauney's coat designed for Gloria Swanson.

These Junya Watanabe designs for SS15 are suitably fun, colourful and outrageous in their channelling of the spirit of Sonia.

Valentino Resort collection designs for SS15, embrace strong block colours and chevrons.

Model Laura Whitmore in Dsquared SS15.

These designs for Dsquared are brilliant! Loud and colourful, and an obvious homage to Sonia's paintings. I bet the movement, colour and pattern are really striking when they are worn.

Love these lively, rhythmic designs above by Ila Malomane who is apparently a relative of Delauney's.

And finally, above, my very own homage to Delauney - the first of a series of life-size Scissorhands Simultaneous dresses inspired by her wonderful paintings, fashion and textiles.

Mademoiselle Privé

Mademoiselle Privé, (like the Hermes Wanderland show of April), is another well designed exhibition at the Saatchi Gallery. It is immaculately presented, but definately a case of style over substance I thought, as some of the rooms were lacking in content, and virtually bare. The space would have been better employed in showing the clothes and products that Coco Chanel is famous for, or displaying more of her personal objects so that we could get more of a feel of her, which is what the exhibition was surely supposed to be about. It really helps to know a little about Coco Chanel and the Chanel brand beforehand, as I left the exhibition feeling as though I got to know precious little more about her than when I went in.

Lacquer screens at the entrance to the show. Chanel apparently loved Chinese lacquer screens and kept many in her apartment.

There was some nice black and white animation at the beginning of the exhibition projected onto the white furniture which complemened the stark room sets.

Oversized comet jewellery. Jewewllery design and sales are an important part of the Chanel brand and Chanel stated: "I wanted to cover women with constellations! Stars! Stars of all sizes..." The comet is one of the icons adopted and developed by Chanel.

These next photos are of other totems that were inspirations to Chanel and informed her aesthetic, style and designs. These totems included numbers, the colours red, black and white (particularly stripes), and lucky numbers.

Pearls were another totem.

Opulent fabrics and embroidery.

Wheat, another important totem in the Chanel canon.

An example of the animation used in the exhibition which was projected onto a variety of white Chanel textiles.

An over-sized tweed catapult with fake pearl, and a guard who wouldn't get out of the shot!

A tweed camelia, one Chanel's favourite blooms made from one of her favourite fabrics.

A room design based on an 18th century French garden design and the interlocking C motif that would be adopted as the Chanel brand logo.

These pictures are taken from the most interesting room of the exhibition up on the first floor, where you could see the haute couture clothes and some amazing diamond jewellery as well as photographs taken by Karl Lagerfeld of celebrities wearing the diamonds. My only complaint about this room was that you weren't allowed to get up close to view the jewellery or haute couture garments as this would have set off the alarm system. Displaying the clothes and jewellery in glass cases would have been a better way for the public to examine the structure of the clothes and the dazzling diamonds at close quarters.

The pieces below are fantastic as they are so sheer and delicate they appear to consist of nothing, and the embroidery is spectacular. Thankfully you were allowed to get up close and personal to examine these pieces.

Loved this vibrant flock wallpaper design on the second floor which lined the walls of the workshop rooms.

Another nice touch was the specially designed and installed gardens filled with seasonal plants that greet you as you arrive and exit the Saatchi Gallery.

This exhibition provided a great opportunity for people-watching, as many of the women visitors viewing the exhibition were very chic, conspicuously clad head to toe in Chanel, or were suitably accessorised in Chanel jewellery, boots or handbags. As you left the exhibition you were handed a free tote and poster, which was a nice touch, (and the closest many of us will get to owning a Chanel bag!).

Mademoiselle Privé
until 1st November
Saatchi Gallery
Duke of York's HQ
King's Road 
London
MADEMOISELLEPRIVECHANEL.COM