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The Met Gala is an annual fundraising event for the Costume Institute of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where fashion and celebrities meet often. He still manages to make eyebrows and this year's theme, "Camp: Notes on Fashion", has sparked a lot of debate. A common question that many fashionistas and cultural critics pose each suit is "… but is it a camp?"
This kind of overly badytical and far too serious commentary on a sensibility meant to make fun of such things is intriguing, but not surprising, given the evolution of the camp concept.
In 1964, author Susan Sontag wrote perhaps her most influential essay, Notes on the Camp . This was one of the first attempts to identify the qualities and parameters of the camp. That's why she chose to write notes rather than a formal essay; the camp being a sensibility or a way of perceiving the world, it is quite difficult to treat systematically. In fact, Sontag would say that he often challenges the very idea of systematization.
For Sontag, camp is the love of "exaggerated," off ", things that are not what they are not", and although it is not merely visual, it has often been expressed in the visual styles of decor, architecture, cinema and fashion.
Some aspects of the Art Nouveau, the old Flash Gordon comics, the 1920s female clothes like feathered boas and fringed boas. clothes, celebrity dandies and "hot chickens" like Oscar Wilde and Paul Lynde, performances "crushed" by clbadic Hollywood actresses like Bette Davis and Judy Garland, etc. The key to camping is a sense of affectation, style on the substance. But just as important is how we look at these things, how we value the badignment.
Missing the Point
Many dresses and costumes from the Met Gala, this year, are trying to capture the essence of the camp and are trying to do it. so do not miss the goal of the camp. Jared Leto has nothing discernible about the fact that he's wearing a replica of his own head. Odd and strange? May be. But nowhere near the camp.
Another interesting example is Celine Dion, who wore a brilliant tribute to Judy Garland and Ziegfield Follies, designed by Oscar de la Renta. Although inspired by the characters of the camp, it is not the outfit here that is the camp, but rather the person who wears it. Dion is probably an icon of the contemporary camp, and she would be a camp no matter what she wore. That's because her celebrity image owes her more than emotional songs and the way she portrays them, her zany character and the exacerbated emotion of some of her public statements.
People who particularly appreciate Celine Dion like it a lot. Ironically, the style of his public personality is deeply entertaining. These appreciators would probably also like the fact that she apparently initially thought the theme of this year's gala was "camping". In nature. Bless her.
Other guests, such as Billy Porter, approached the camp's sensibility with much more precision by incorporating a scandalous pump and performance into their attendance.
Porter was dressed as a kind of Egyptian goddess, carried off by six nubiles. , shirtless men. Although it adds a certain show, it was, like any guest appearance, an event designed and repeated.
For Sontag and many of the other thinkers who followed, there are really two ways to "make" a camp. One is the "naive camp" and the other the "conscious camp". The naive camp is Judy Garland's camp type. Garland did not intend to become a gay icon, but she became so because her diligent and overworked performances invited a large portion of queer people to consider her as a camp figure.
Homobadual men particularly appreciated the damaging effects of his performances, in a manner similar to the way drag queens are valued in the queer community. They are not appreciated for the quality of their performances, but for the amount of performance that they put in their synchronized song and dance on the lips.
The "conscious camp"
"The Camp of Conscience" was presented at the Met Gala this year, take Lady Gaga's "Russian doll" dresses, each layer referring to Hollywood glamor excessively.An oversized version of the dress of Marilyn Monroe in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes is removed and under it lies a black, a slimmer femme fatale number, followed by another unveiling of a pink dress with more realistic proportions.Gaga is very knowledgeable about queer cultural aesthetics and pop, and there was an amusing storytelling, but his many Hollywood references do not necessarily suggest a camp.
Contrast this with the simple but effective costume of Amber Valletta: it looks like she's bears a large green loofa and, on most of the photos, she takes herself far too seriously. This is the kind of camp that could please Sontag.
The best type of camp is one who does not know it. Which is just another way of saying that you can not really conceive and carry your way into the camp's sensibility.
Matthew Sini, Senior Lecturer, Screen Printing, Sunshine Coast University.
This article was first published in The Conversation.
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