Fashioning in the Flat: Collage as a Contemporary Approach to Self-Styling
Claire A. Calvert
Fashion and Textile Studies: History, Theory, Museum Practice
About this Item
- Title
- Fashioning in the Flat: Collage as a Contemporary Approach to Self-Styling
- Contributor Names
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Calvert, Claire A. (Author)
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Fashion Institute of Technology, State University of New York. Fashion and Textile Studies: History, Theory, Museum Practice (Degree granting institution)
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Hill, Colleen (Thesis advisor)
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Davidson, Hilary (Thesis advisor)
- Date
- 2024
- Degree Information
- M.A. Fashion Institute of Technology, State University of New York 2024
- Department: Fashion and Textile Studies: History, Theory, Museum Practice
- Advisors: Colleen Hill; Hilary Davidson
- Abstract
- Fashion and collage are related in that they have historically been—and remain—intertwined with self-expression and the development of personal style. Like fashion, collage, which is created by collecting, cutting, and combining things, conveys meaning through a system of signs. Historically, collage has been defined rather strictly as a paper medium. However, leaving space for more expansive material parameters lends greater significance to aspects of collage such as the ways in which fragments are combined. Examples of fashion-collage from the seventeenth century through today exemplify that the activity of collage uniquely allows for individuals to explore style expression beyond the physical body and demonstrate material literacy. For fashion media and retailers, collage can be a means of encouraging fashion consumerism and suggesting choice. Examining fashion magazines from their seventeenth-century emergence to their present-day state illuminates the ways in which magazine images evolve. As printing and photography become more accessible and widely used, editorials become more collage-like. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the disposability of magazines, combined with their abundance of enticing illustrations and photography, encouraged readers to use them as materials for fashion-collages–serving as what I term "off-the-body fashion expressions." In the twenty-first century, the now-defunct fashion-collaging website Polyvore took fashion collaging from the physical to the digital, serving as a platform to both create and share digital fashion mood-boards. As the majority of twenty-first-century fashion is ready-to-wear, and consumers have largely lost their material literacy, digital fashion-collage proved to be an excellent medium for building sartorial-sign literacy, and continuing the longstanding relationship of fashion and collage.
- Rights
- In Copyright
- The copyright for this work is held by its author/creator(s). Usage of this material beyond what is permitted by copyright law must first be cleared with the rights-holder(s). This work has been made available online by the Fashion Institute of Technology Gladys Marcus Library strictly for research and educational purposes. If you are the copyright holder for this work and have any objections to this work being made available online, please notify us immediately at [email protected].
- This item must not be sold to any third party vendors.
- Identifier
- FIT Repository ID: etd_001003
- URN/ISBN: 9798302163660
- Related Materials
- Also available from ProQuest
- Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 86-07.
- Language
- English
- Publisher
- Ann Arbor : ProQuest Dissertations & Theses,
Citation
Calvert, C. A. (2024). Fashioning in the Flat: Collage as a Contemporary Approach to Self-Styling [Master's thesis, Fashion Institute of Technology, State University of New York]. FIT Institutional Repository. https://institutionalrepository.fitnyc.edu/item/599918
Calvert, Claire A. Fashioning in the Flat: Collage As a Contemporary Approach to Self-Styling. 2024. Fashion Institute of Technology, State University of New York, Master's thesis. FIT Digital Repository, https://institutionalrepository.fitnyc.edu/item/599918
Calvert, Claire A. "Fashioning in the Flat: Collage As a Contemporary Approach to Self-Styling." Master's thesis, Fashion Institute of Technology, State University of New York, 2024. https://institutionalrepository.fitnyc.edu/item/599918