Main entry:

Evans, Caroline, 1954-

Title & Author:

The mechanical smile : modernism and the first fashion shows in France and America 1900-1929 / Caroline Evans.

Publication:

New Haven : Yale University Press, [2013]
©2013

Description:

331 pages : illustrations (some color) ; 29 cm

Notes:
Includes bibliographical references (pages 306-314) and index.
Part I. The fashion show : Prehistory: nineteenth century fashion modelling -- 1900-1914: The rationalization of the body -- 1900-1914: French fashion on the world stage -- 1900-1917: America -- 1914-1919: The nationalisation of the body -- 1919-1929: Fashion in motion -- Part II. The mannequin : Architecture: factories of elegance -- Audiences: the commerce of the look -- Objects: industrial smiles -- Prolepsis: future bodies -- Movement: the mannequin walk -- Flow: the mannequin pose.

Summary:

In the early 20th century, the desire to see clothing in motion flourished on both sides of the Atlantic: models tangoed, slithered, swaggered, and undulated before customers in couture houses and department stores. The Mechanical Smile traces the history of the earliest fashion shows in France and the United States from their origins in the 1880s to 1929, situating them in the context of modernism and the rationalization of the body. Fashion shows came into being concurrently with film, and this book explores the connections between fashion and early cinema, which arguably functioned as what Walter Benjamin called "new velocities"--Forces that altered the rhythms of modern life. Using significant new archival evidence, The Mechanical Smile shows how so-called "mannequin parades" employed the visual language of modernism to translate business and management methods into visual seduction. Caroline Evans, a leading fashion historian, argues for an expanded definition of modernism as both gestural and performative, drawing on literary and performance theory rather than relying on art and design history. The fashion show, Evans posits, is a singular nodal point where the disparate histories of commerce, modernism, gender, and the body converge.

ISBN:

9780300189537 (alk. paper)
0300189532 (alk. paper)

Subject:

Fashion shows France History.
Fashion shows United States History.
Modernism (Aesthetics) France.
Modernism (Aesthetics) United States.
Présentations de collections (Mode) France Histoire.
Présentations de collections (Mode) États-Unis Histoire.
Modernisme (Esthétique) France.
Modernisme (Esthétique) États-Unis.
Beauty and Fashion.
Fashion shows.
Modernism (Aesthetics)
Mode
Präsentation
Modeschau
Mannequin
Modevisningar historia.
Modernism estetiska aspekter.
Mode, USA.
Mode, Frankrike.
Frankrike.
Förenta staterna.
France.
United States.
USA
Frankreich
1880-1929

Form/genre:

History.

Holdings:

Location: Library main 283535
Call No.: BIB 221851
Status: Available