Paris Fashion Week: Rick Owens stuns with human backpacks at SS16 show
updated the 6 October 2015 à 22:22
Backpacks now have a new twist to them thanks to the visionary, Rick Owens.
Just when we thought avant garde had reached its limit with clothes from brands like Alexander McQueen, or Lady Gaga with her famous meat dress, Rick Owens proved us wrong with his newest Sprin/ Summer 16 show at Paris Fashion Week.
We’ll just dive right in and say that his models were precariously carrying one another as backpacks. By that we mean as body harnesses, and it was the strangest thing ever seen on a runway. Usually, it’s the outfits that may be weird, or quirky or never seen before, but to use the human form in this way is new and slightly disturbing.
But, as they say, art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable. And this made many people very disturbed. The models-as-backpacks looked uncomfortable and their bodies were distorted. However, Rick Owens had a message to convey. He didn’t do this for laughs or for attention, though he got a lot of both for doing this. The American fashion designer told a source that the collection is “about raising women, women becoming women, and women supporting women.”
Once we knew this, it became fairly obvious why he did what he did, and while it made sense, people are still either cringing, laughing or nodding.
Whichever your reaction may be, you can’t deny that the message behind it is empowering, even though the execution was extremely eccentric and forward thinking. Strange, and highly unlikely to be a trend, it still is something that will etched into our minds.
Bernice Ng
Photos: Getty Images
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