(Corot, excerpt from Ville d'Avray)
Walking through the woods after crying, moments after golden hour has passed, minutes before darkness falls. This is what most Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot's paintings feel like to me.
You may imagine my surprise, when such a vivid image came to me while browsing some of the looks from Valentino Fall-Winter Ready to Wear collection of 2016. This collection focused on ballet as well as the "happenings" aspect in dance. The collection included some "slowing down and living in the moment"-type of commentary, according to Sarah Mower on the Vogue website. And although not all of the designs caught my eye and provoked the association of fresh dirt, gentle rain and wet grass, some did, and here I would like to present some of them alongside a few of Corot's paintings.
My decision of combining the two worlds isn't entirely opposed to the review written on the Vogue website. I think that the moment of quiet reflection (both mental and physical) is present in both the collection and the paintings.
The delicate silky frozen pond-like fabrics of the designs combined with "strict" looking, warm and harsh feeling materials are some of the motives in the collection that caught my eye the most. Those different but not opposing aspects, in my mind, are corresponding to Corot's fragile yet reassuring combination of mirror-like lakes and either incredibly intricate fluffy woods or stone-cold industrialism, which, in Corot's paintings, seem to have soft and nostalgic yet melancholic and rather harsh qualities. I think that this combination is one of the most peaceful states of being, of accepting reality. Hopeful, yet, in a way, entirely hopeless.
(Corot, Recollection of Mortefontaine / Valentino)
(Corot, Landscape with Bridge / Valentino)
(Corot, The Sin-Le-Noble Road near Douai / Valentino)
(Corot, Le Lac, Effet de Nuit / Valentino)
(Corot, A Woman Gathering Faggots near Ville d'Avray / Valentino)
Thank you for reading,
Until next time,
Alisa.
