On the 22nd anniversary of 9/11, the Parsons MFA students presented their graduate collections at the Brooklyn Museum. Organized mostly in-house, it was an extremely thoughtful and effective show production. Sean Slaughter opened with a spoken word piece, “We Dem Kids,” and DJ Ice and saxophonist Marvin Carter created a dialogue between recorded and live music. This free flowing sense of connection, and of movement, is one of the casualties of 9/11.
In the before before times, you might call it, there was a different sort of faith in others. What is implied in rituals such as taking your shoes off in the airport is a lack of trust, isn’t it? It’s worth noting that these Parsons graduates grew up in a post-attack world and are digital natives who lived through the pandemic.
The show was organized into three parts: Heritage (identity and craft); 2113 (future and technology); and Generational (nostalgia, connection to the past). To this editor’s eye, the students’ main preoccupation was with materials. Left to rebuild the torn fabric of society, they spent endless hours knitting, collaging, embroidering—you name it—the materials from which their garments were made. They are starting over, starting from the threads. There was a big emphasis on knits that were more experimental than warm and fuzzy (see especially the work of Sunny Ning, Ying Kong, and Chang Liu).
The subject of isolation came up over and over again. Anna Roth, who made the puppet-like figures, also produced a pamphlet titled “How to Fit In: A Thorough Guide for the Deeply Anxious.” Hsiao-Han Kuo titled her collection “Guide for Un-Isolation,” and wrote that her intent was to “underscore her belief in the healing power of touch and human connection.” Lorena Pipenco hinted that furry friends might be the best companions, while Mel Corchado created pieces for and with the people who wore them, to foster a sense of community.
Listening to the students speak about duality brought the mind back around to the lost towers. They were twins, not avatars. The latter predominates in a world where it’s ever more difficult to distinguish substance from surface. There’s a meta aspect to many things, including in these collections. Both Nan Jiang and Corchado showed molded torsos. Last year Yamil Arbaje staged an IRL exhibition by an imaginary artist. The designer’s graduate collection consisted of looks from different phases of the artist’s life, which at times, overlapped with his own. Building on her experience attending private school, Ren Haixi deconstructed the prep look by creating meticulously distressed materials that looked smart (she has worked at Thom Browne).
Recent statistics show that girls are outperforming boys in academics. Sometimes it feels like masculinity and men are being put under a microscope and through the ringer. Fragility, not toxicity, was the feeling evoked by the waifs in Natsumi Aoki’s layered looks. Siri’s collaged designs were made of thongs, nylons, and panties, and her opening look featured a bejeweled penis. Story (Daorui Story Si) also depicted this part of the anatomy, though less overtly, in a chiffon top and cropped jacket. At first glance they looked like iterations on green carnations, a marker of homosexuality popularized by Oscar Wilde. How one hides and conceals one sexual identity was something he considered.
Many designs projected far from the body, prohibiting close contact. Crinoline shapes (essentially wearable cages) popped up now and again, while two students blew things out of proportion through the use of inflatables. One of them was Yu Gong, who worked with 3D modeling and more traditional methods to create super-sized designs intended to connect the physical and digital realms.
There were very few pieces that went down the runway that could easily be imagined on a rack in a store, and in a New York season that’s feeling very commercial, understandably so with a challenging retail market, that was especially exciting and inspiring. As Sean Slaughter said so eloquently: “This is for the coalition of dreamers and doers who refuse to be confined.” We need “dem kids” (to borrow from the title of the poet’s work) here in the Land of the Free.
