Très Parisien, 8 septembre 1921 : SUZERAINE / Du velours noir coupé (...) 1921

This fashion plate, printed in 1921, captures a chic Parisian style with velvety blacks and ruby reds. It’s fascinating how it uses simple lines and blocks of color to suggest texture and form, really showing us the process of creating an image. Look at the way the white fur trim is rendered – not trying to mimic actual fur, but instead giving us this graphic, almost playful suggestion of fluffiness. There’s a real joy in how the artist uses the materials, the ink and paper, to convey a sense of luxury and sophistication. It's like a shorthand for elegance. This reminds me a little of Sonia Delaunay’s fabric designs, which also explored the intersection of art and fashion with a similar sense of bold color and pattern. Both artists seem to embrace ambiguity. It's up to us to decide what this says about its historical context.