Utility and Absurdity

The style section of The Times just ran an article, Change We Could Live With, and in it, writer Guy Trebay admonishes everyone from Madonna to the Zagat guide to find real, meaningful (and fashionable) change in the new year.

He ends the article saying, “Let’s ditch what the fashion commentator, stylist and gadfly Robert Verdi calls the ‘the gloss and veneer of fabulosity’ and offload at least some of the giddy wealth and ostentation, the label dressing and It-bag consumption of a minute ago. All that nonsense feels dowdier, more clunky and more gross than ever.”

Though most of the artists I know are adept at balancing thrift store finds with haute-er pieces, it is a refreshingly straightforward admonishment to remember and try to apply to oneself...to strike a balance between utility and elegance, the uniform of the self versus the uniform of the crowd, and in so doing, remember that being an artist is not a suit to cloak oneself in, but an avocation, a job, and a calling.

And in my case, a chastisement against endless purchases of heels I do not wear and purses I forget to carry.