Tigersprung : Fashion in Modernity

by Ulrich Lehmann

• ISBN13: 9780262122313
• ISBN10: 0262122316
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2000-11-01
• Publisher: Mit Pr

Summary

Far from being a frivolous subject, fashion is the supreme expression of the contemporary spirit. Sartorial elements embody the pace and rhythm of modern society and culture as few other ideas or commodities do. Indeed, the hallmarks of la modernitefound their most immediate reflection in la mode. But no one until now has attempted a rigorous analysis of fashion, on a par with attempts to construct a philosophy of art, music, or literature. In this book Ulrich Lehmann sets out to do just that. He explores the interplay between philosophical ideas and fashion, reading texts and textiles, discourse and dresses, to investigate modernity from a variety of perspectives: artistic, philosophical, sociological, and historical. The stage for this interplay between intellectual concept and sartorial expression is Parisian society from the mid-nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century. Lehmann focuses on a core of pivotal individuals, beginning with Charles Baudelaire in the 1850s, continuing with Stephane Mallarme and Georg Simmel, and arriving at Walter Benjamin, Louis Aragon, and Andre Breton almost a century later. The book's title comes from Benjamin's use of the German word Tigersprung(tiger's leap) to describe fashion's leap into the past to create an ever-changing present. Lehmann focuses in particular on Benjamin's Arcades Project as an unfinished work on the philosophy of fashion. He also looks at the role of fashion in the work of the Dadaists and surrealists, who used clothes and accessories as simulacra for the human body and mind. Fashion, according to Lehmann, does not just reflect social change but is a social force in its own right. In creating the perfect expression of the contemporary spirit-by drawing on the past-fashion excels at anticipating things to come.

Table of Contents

Introduction	xii
Baudelaire, Gautier, and the Origins of Fashion in Modernity	3	(50)
Fashion Written I	4	(1)
Mode et modernite	5	(23)
Charles Baudelaire, the Originator	5	(6)
Theophile Gautier, the Contemporary	11	(7)
The Feminine Article	18	(6)
The Masculine Mode	24	(4)
Cravate rouge and blouse bleue	28	(6)
What Price Revolution?	34	(2)
The First Tiger's Leap	36	(2)
Quote within a Quote	38	(9)
A Passing Fashion	47	(6)
Mallarme and the Elegance of Fashion in Modernity	53	(72)
Mode et modernite: Stephane Malarme, the Modernist	54	(5)
The Goddess	59	(5)
The La(te)st Fashion	64	(10)
Fashion Written II-IV	74	(28)
The Epic and the Epicene	74	(14)
Mode et fiction---modification	88	(10)
Vocabulaire vestimentaire	98	(4)
Mallarme and His Subscribers: Corresponding Ideals	102	(11)
La Derniere Mode in Retrospect: ``Apres nous le delice?!''	113	(12)
Simmel and the Rationale of Fashion in Modernity	125	(74)
Mode und Moderne: Georg Simmel, the Philosopher	127	(8)
Simmel's Methodology	135	(8)
Mode to Measure	135	(2)
Fashion, the Fragment, and the Whole	137	(6)
Imitation and Differentiation	143	(10)
La querelle des anciens et des modernes	143	(3)
Imitor ergo sum	146	(2)
Difference and Reference	148	(5)
The Revolution in Fashion	153	(1)
Class and Classification	154	(4)
Critical Theory versus Simmelian Analogy	158	(4)
The Second Tiger's Leap	162	(7)
Elements of Fashion	169	(14)
The Stranger	169	(8)
Transitoriness	177	(6)
Fin(esse) de siecle	183	(5)
Fashion's Phantom	188	(11)
Benjamin and the Revolution of Fashion in Modernity	199	(82)
The Object	201	(2)
The Idea of Fashion	203	(4)
Mode and Metaphor	207	(7)
Skirting the Memory	207	(4)
Back in the Fold	211	(3)
Construction; Work	214	(9)
A Fetish in Fashion	223	(2)
The Confluence of mode et modernite	225	(8)
Eternal Recurrence and Redemption	233	(8)
Tigersprung	241	(10)
The Third Tiger's Leap	241	(6)
The Standstill of the Tiger (on the Catwalk)	247	(4)
Clothed History	251	(8)
Fashioning the Arcades	259	(5)
Le revers: The Other Side of Reality	264	(8)
Death a la mode	272	(2)
Consumption, Redemption, or Revolution?	274	(7)
The Imagination of Fashion in Modernity	281	(119)
Fashion Written V	287	(3)
Benjamin on Grandville and Surrealism: The Clothes of Five years Ago	290	(9)
Mythe et mode	299	(9)
Fashion Written VI: A Structured (Pur)Suit	308	(5)
Dada's Dandyism and Surrealist Imagination	313	(2)
Fashion Written VII: Tailoring Irony	315	(8)
Aragon and Breton: Le cabinet des cravates	323	(7)
Vache and Breton	330	(24)
Initiation and Imitation	330	(22)
L'eternel carre de dentelle	352	(2)
Modern Mythology	354	(46)
Monocularity	355	(17)
On Locomotives and Top Hats	372	(28)
Conclusion	400	(4)
Notes	404	(100)
Selected Bibliography	504	(14)
Index	518