The underworld we’re all living in
It feels like Rick Owens possesses a stifling sixth sense. If the menswear collection presented one month ago leaned over the control and brutality of law enforcement, the FW26 womenswear collection feels just as clear-cut with the current dire geopolitical turmoils. Vocal political dissident and glittering seductress icon Marlene Dietrich was the muse of the show. Identically titled “Tower,” the collection leans once more into subversion tactics, favouring a prayer of love, hope, and protection amidst global unrest.
Dipping into the depths of the Palais de Tokyo, the vast, cavernous void filled with smoke is opened up by skinny silhouettes – the first one carries “Cerberus,” the guards of life after death in Greek mythology, and god of the dead, “Hades” plastered on their collarbones. Welcome to the underworld, the show dictates. Highly resistant fabrics, such as kevlar or bull leather, offer a hellacious shield to the body. Sheath-like figures are also fringed-up, resisting and elongating the body (and let’s not lie, the Rick towering heels also aid in the mission). Long hair goat skin coats fall in the cotton-candy machine and bow to Dietrich’s legendary humungous fur coats.
Bernardo Martins is also back in palpable form, reaction and protest translated on the real physical body. Pastel coloured sweeping lashes contrast with the muddy, earthy colours that melt in their environment. Martins’ recognisable jagged, raw-edged cuts are halo-ed up, with thin mono-strands dropping to the shoulder and beyond.
The rigid shielded qualities of verticality meet with a certain lightheartedness and earnest openness. And in the depths of the underworld, prayers find their way.
Words by Lora Lorev
Images Courtesy Of The Rick Owens
