Sakamoto Ryuichi x Luis Vuitton x Switch Magazine

Switch magazine recently featured a photo spread of Ryuichi Sakamoto for Luis Vuitton. The photos show Sakamoto, looking particularly grim and serious, wearing pristine Vuitton gear, amdist a darkly saturated forest environment. Sakamoto as solitary wanderer, as “sticking out” from the environment to such an extent that he manages to blend back in. Notice how [...]

An Interview with Japanese Eyewear Brand: Less Than Human

The Less Than Human glasses that I bought last year in Tokyo, Japan, are sitting now in a clean metal case on my bookshelf. I am saving them for those moments when I want to transform my appearance – a thick, black rimmed metamorphosis. I save them now, in that clean metal case, as they [...]

COMME Des GARCONS

I found this Comme Des Garcons box discarded on the sidewalk on yesterday’s late-night stroll through the streets of a city in Chiba. Sadly, no clothes inside. Comme Des Garcon’s founder and leader is Rei Kawakubo, who, instead of studying fashion, studied philosophy and literature. More about Rei Kawakubo and CDG: Rei Kawakubo

The Cobrasnake: Creating Culture

The Cobrasnake (Mark Hunter) takes photographs and makes T-shirts. His brand has expanded; he has infiltrated the clubs and the streets of the world. A casual glance at his website shows only the latest T-shirts available for purchase and a dense archive of Cobrasnake’s photographs. Said simply: the man is busy. The people caught in [...]

Neither: Samuel Beckett

Yesterday I made a viral video reading of Samuel Beckett’s poem “Neither.” It is silent. I had originally recorded myself reading the poem and layered it over the top of the video, but decided against inserting it into the video. Watching it silently after reading the poem left an interesting resonance, which hopefully you will [...]

Voids of Concealed Exposure: Evening Sartoriology

Mutants Our bodies blend in and at the same time seem to stick out. We cover our bodies in layers of buttons, zippers, belts, beads, metals and cloths of all sorts. This strikes me as slightly odd. I can see the function of covering the body for social reasons and to protect the body from [...]

The Secretive Gaze of Chloe Sevigny and Tadanobu Asano

The image above is of Tadanobu Asano and Chloe Sevigny for Uniqlo’s Spring 2008 UT collection. “UT” is, as stated on Uniqlo’s website, “a limited edition collection of t-shirts designed by renowned artists, designers, photographers, etc.” What interests me today is this UT publicity photograph and what it might reveal to us. That is, what [...]