GRAPHIC TEES

Runway designers slogan and graphic tees 

On street fashion

Some research on Italian Futurism

Italian Futurism was officially launched in 1909 when Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, an Italian intellectual, published his “Founding and Manifesto of Futurism” in the French newspaper Le Figaro. Marinetti’s continuous leadership ensured the movement’s cohesion for three and half decades, until his death in 1944.

To be a Futurist in the Italy of the early 20th century was to be modern, young, and insurgent. Inspired by the markers of modernity—the industrial city, machines, speed, and flight—Futurism’s adherents exalted the new and the disruptive. They sought to revitalize what they determined to be a static, decaying culture and an impotent nation that looked to the past for its identity. Futurism began as a literary avant-garde, and the printed word was vital for this group. Manifestos, words-in-freedom poems, novels, and journals were intrinsic to the dissemination of their ideas. But the Futurists quickly embraced the visual and performing arts, politics, and even advertising. Futurist artists experimented with the fragmentation of form, the collapsing of time and space, the depiction of dynamic motion, and dizzying perspectives. Their style evolved from fractured elements in the 1910s to a mechanical language in the ’20s, and then to aerial imagery in the ’30s. No vanguard exists in a void—all are touched by their historical context. The Futurists’ celebration of war as a means to remake Italy and their support of Italy’s entrance into World War I also constitute part of the movement’s narrative, as does the later, complicated relationship between Futurism and Italian fascism.

This exhibition endeavors to convey the spirit of Italian Futurism in all of its complexity. The Guggenheim Museum’s architecture lends itself to the display of this multidisciplinary idiom. Taking its cue from the Futurists’ concept of the “total work of art” (an ensemble that surrounds the viewer in a completely Futurist environment) and their aim to achieve a “reconstruction of the universe,” the presentation integrates works in multiple mediums on all levels of the rotunda. Objects are organized in a roughly chronological order, with filmic components bringing to life some of the movement’s more ephemeral activities, such as performance and declamation. The Futurists were insurrectionary and stridently vocal, and thus Italian Futurism welcomes a certain amount of visual and aural cacophony.

Futurism was punctuated by paradoxes: while predominantly antifeminine, it had active female participants; while calling for a breakdown between “high” and “low” culture, it valued painting above other forms of expression; while glorifying the machine, it shied away from the mechanized medium of film. By 1929, the artists who had denounced traditional institutions saw their leader, Marinetti, become a member of the Academy of Italy. And many of the revolutionary Futurists complied in some way with the Fascist regime. Through a comprehensive examination of Italian Futurism’s full history, the exhibition offers an opportunity to reassess one of the most contentious of modernist movements.

http://exhibitions.guggenheim.org/futurism/

FUTURISM

Futuristic fashion is being described as “post-human”, which is inspired by artificial intelligence and illustrated by technical driven design and a new generation of technical materials.

Post-human is a concept originating in the fields of science fiction, futurology, contemporary art, and philosophy that literally means a person or entity that exists in a state beyond being human. The concept addresses questions of ethics and justice, language and trans-species communication, social systems, and the intellectual aspirations of interdisciplinarity.

The post-human is a speculative being that represents or seeks to re-conceive the human. It is the object of post-humanist criticism, which critically questions humanism, a branch of humanist philosophy which claims that human nature is a universal state from which the human being emerges; human nature is autonomous, rational, capable of free will, and unified in itself as the apex of existence. Thus, the post-human position recognizes imperfectability and disunity within him or herself, and understands the world through heterogeneous perspectives while seeking to maintain intellectual rigour and a dedication to objective observations. 

Key to this post-human practice is the ability to fluidly change perspectives and manifest oneself through different identities. The post-human, for critical theorists of the subject, has an emergent ontology rather than a stable one; in other words, the post-human is not a singular, defined individual, but rather one who can "become" or embody different identities and understand the world from multiple, heterogeneous perspectives.

Futuristic fashion include some aspects like custom fabrics, embossed textures, liquid or metallic elements, and glowing LED lights inside of mesh materials. Futurism is also further supported by the rise of 3D-printed clothing, footwear, and accessories. And this is the element that I want to incorporate with the concept “wearable painting”.

WEARING PAINTING

My forecasting trend will be wearable painting. 

Instead of graphic design and images, this time will be artworks, paintings and drawings.

But also using visual to communicate and express ourself.

Those painting and artworks will no longer just be a 2D flat object that is being exhibit or show in the museum or gallery, we can now wear it on us. And more people can appreciate these old and historic artworks and also use it as a visual aids to express our thoughts and feelings. We can even draw or come out with our own artwork and drawing that describe and represent you.

INSPIRATION

Viktor & Rolf
When museums paintings meet the world of fashion, a series of amazing Haute Couture creations imagined by the Dutch designers Viktor & Rolf, who transform Baroque paintings and their frames into surreal dresses, playing with the flexibility of the fabric, the angular shapes of the frame and the patterns of the painting.

WHY people like to wear GRAPHIC/SLOGAN TEES?

People wear graphic/slogan tee, they are trying to reflect their thought through the words on the shirt. Many of us like to wear this type of t-shirt now. Using t-shirt quote any one can express their feelings. Fashion now can be the most accessible way we reinforce and communicate our identities on a daily basis.

By dressing according to a popular style, we can immediately associate ourselves with a particular group and seed our identity with the others. Of course, fashion can also be far more intentional, subtle and creative, where our identity is created/reinforced piecemeal through being creative about the clothes we wear, as well as factoring in decisions about how the clothes were produced and the story behind their production.

Graphic tees and shirts with quotes clearly and very literal show about what a person is trying to say. With all the graphic tees out there that don’t seem to be saying much. Shirts can say something about what a person stands for and a underutilized way to claim our voice in the world. 

Wearing a t-shirt or piece of clothing that directly states what we believe is an opportunity to aspire ourselves to action. In a small way, it allows us to externalize our voice and it challenges us to live whatever it is that we’re communicating through fashion.