Voss 2001

VOSS

This show was teeming with the subject matter of self-reflection, torment, anguish and above all of this - the ebbing and flowing presence of beauty.

SETTING

Voss show was nothing short of monumental. The audience sat around a mirrored cube, which, when lit from inside, revealed itself to be a mental-hospital holding cell.

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The Show

Demented girls, wearing hospital headbands and everything from extraordinary mussel-shell skirts to impossibly chic pearl-colored cocktail dresses, slithered and strutted while uselessly attempting to fly over the cuckoo's nest.

But amidst all the insanity, there was a cornucopia of startlingly elegant—and wearable—pantsuits, flouncy party dresses, and even a spectator pump or two.

McQueen was at his very best: There were gothic, theatrical pieces, like a dress with a miniature castle and rat posing as a shoulder pad; a top made out of a jigsaw puzzle; and a huge feathered creation with stuffed eagles suspended over the model's head, poised to attack à la Hitchcock.

The Impact

Depictions of madness and incarceration were the principal inspirations behind the collection’s presentation. Voss, like so many of McQueen’s collections, harnessed multiple, disparate themes which coalesced into the designer’s unique vision of beauty.

The finale was the most transgressive of any of McQueen’s catwalk shows: a recreation of Joel-Peter Witkin’s Sanitarium (1983). As the models dispersed and the soundtrack of a pulsing heartbeat gave way to a flat-line monotone, the glass box shattered to reveal the voluptuous, naked figure of fetish writer Michelle Olley, reclining on a horned chaise longue in the graceful pose of a Botticelli painting, her masked head bowed and attached to a breathing tube.

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Moths fluttered about her before the lights dimmed and left the audience to ponder the meaning of beauty.

Longread was created during the course ’Composition in design’
Designer Kate Klimanova

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