Robe de lainage, couleur taupe avec de la broderie de laine bleue. Chapeau de paille garni de fleurs. 1919

This fashion plate, made anonymously sometime around 1919, probably with watercolor and ink, imagines a taupe wool dress with blue wool embroidery and a straw hat trimmed with flowers. I wonder about this person who made the plate. Did they have to keep up with the changing styles in post-war France? The dress has these stripes of blue and rose-like circles at the hem. The color has a flat opacity to it. I can imagine the artist dabbing the paint, filling in the space between the linear drawing. It’s kind of a stencil technique in a way. There is a conversation happening between fashion, style, and artmaking, and for me, there are no hard lines between any of it. Just like painting, the process of designing and making clothes is an embodied form of expression. Both embrace ambiguity and uncertainty, allowing for multiple interpretations. In the end, it’s all art!