Kazys Varnelis Reading

I will start by agreeing with the statement that fashion can be both democratic and elitist. Let us begin by taking the author’s example of King Louis XIV of France. The King was inarguably an elitist. He was wealthy, upper-class and of course the ruler of a country. HE set the guiding idea of what fashion was. In a sense, he was the first Joan Crawford. However, how does fashion become democratic? King Louis’ fashion sense becomes democratic because others choose to emulate him. Nobles dressed like the king to try to say that they were good friends with the king or to demonstrate that they were among France’s best. Would the lower classes have dressed like he king if they could have afforded to? I believe that they would have in order to prove that they had style and were better then what you had thought of them originally.
Let us jump forward to a more modern example of fashion elitist, The New York Times Style Magazine. The whole magazine serves as a showcase for ideas and designs in part set by the elitists, the rich and famous of the fashion world. A similar thing happens in King Louis court. The lesser classes choose to emulate the elitist designs. They are often not as extreme a ridiculous as the original fashion but they are indeed often similar or at least influenced by.
You are now probably wondering what this has to do with Power, Protest, and Pleasure. Let us begin fist with Power. The elitist of course has power; they have to power to decide what fashion will be in this season. If elitist decided that short shorts or dressing, as a 1950s housewife is the fashion of the season then that is what the fashion becomes. However, the non-elitist or Average Joe has power. The non-elitist has the power to decide if they will emulate or go along with the elitist ideas or if they will reject them in part or entirely. This is where we begin to get into protest and pleasure. The elitist gets their pleasure from being the trendsetter. The non-elitist gets pleasure being in fashion or from being able to say, “I have Style” and to show off how “cool” they are and what good “taste” they have. The non-elitist can also get pleasure from protest. Protest is essentially a form of masochism as we learned from ”The Hack”. Here protest is often the rejection in part or the whole of the elitist ideals of fashion. Pleasure comes from the act of rejecting the elitist beliefs and choosing an alterative that the protestor thinks best fits or represents them. This again demonstrates the democratic values of fashion. There is the option to protest if you so chooses, the option to decide what you wear. That is an option or choice not available in all aspects of life, which is perhaps why so many people express themselves though clothing.
By now you are have probably noticed that I have covered fashion but not architecture. Architecture is remarkable similar to fashion which is why the author wanted to take that class so long ago. Architecture is the fashion of buildings. It is also so by a group of elitists who deicide what the new “look” will be. Once the “look” is set, it is then often copied throughout the world. It is the same system as with fashion. A “look” or “design” is set and then emulated or rejected by the others. Take for example the modern architecture of Purchase. When the College was built the "modern” look as in style. It was what the elitists said was style. Purchase was in fact built by an elitist our esteemed and perhaps best ever Governor Nelson D. Rockefeller. How is architecture emulated by the non-elitist? For this example, lets look at some of the Projects. Many built by the Housing Authority are in the “modern” style. Why? So, they could paint a happier picture of the world and to try to say that the Projects were good places to live. Using modern architecture probably helped to cut down on cost, too. The style was also rejected, some people choose to build buildings using glass instead of brick. If you really want to see rejection just look at the student body here. Fashion and architecture are similar, you can reread what I previously wrote and replace “fashion” with “architecture” and it will still make sense because they both operate under the same system. In fact I would argue that almost anything could fit into the description I gave.

The End