Current location:	MJ's Dark Fortress
Current mood:	busy
Current music:	Shut Me Up - Mindless Self Indulgence
Entry tags:	ryerson, university

Megalomaniacal babble.
Contrary to my last entry, I guess the "reflection" paper for PD in the arts needn't be about how the course "helped" us. In any case, I'm sharing it with you, mostly to get it off my hard drive.

The common denominator of my life up to present can easily be described as preparation for a flourishing career as a fashion designer. I was born as the daughter of a high-school art teacher, which has given to me a creative environment in which I have been free to experiment and hone my skills for the past seventeen years^*. At a very young age, I took to drawing as my craft of choice and practiced it at any given opportunity, regardless of the setting. My subject of choice just so happened to be people - as I have been endlessly fascinated by how one chooses to express themselves in the most literal way possible; what they wear and how they wear it.

I see myself as an innovator of something new and unseen before. To me, “art” isn’t limited to one medium, one subject or one credo (I say this coming from having an extensive background in both the visual and performing arts) but personally, I establish the worth of any piece of art on the basis of its innovation, gauging of a new genre or movement. From the age of five, you can be trained and spoon-fed musical knowledge to become a “brilliant” pianist. You can be an “artist” who never deviates from realism; painting what they know, what they see in front of themselves every day. But these people’s titles are by no means synonymous with “creator”. Those who infer themselves as artists but do not explore, create or stray beyond the unabstract thought process of comprehension, are no better than money traders or any other faceless, high ranking business executive who works by profit motivation alone, without bettering society. Regurgitation of familiar imagery is a pointless endeavor.

This being said, my critical goal as a fashion designer is to present imagery which the general population is unfamiliar with. Particularly with fashion design, this by no means a simple undertaking. Like any other art form, every trend eventually succumbs to obsolescence and if it’s lucky, it may resurface for a short while. Fashion is a catalyzed model of this certainty; trends are just as contagious as they are implosive. Yet, I see a particular irony with a disturbing tendency of how all new styles are adaptations of former styles- obsolete styles and maybe not so much based on their aesthetics but perhaps on the absence of inspiration among the ruling class of fashion.

Anyone can give mention that the new, the ahead of its time, the outright bizarre will not be accepted with open arms. One of my dissatisfactions with fashion is that too many people, devoid of creativity, enter the field in hopes of making a quick buck or two. The easiest way to accomplish this dismal goal is to ride the wave and produce a line of clothing exactly on par with every other collection at the time. However, a collection of something revolutionary could either be too threatening or the delicacy the people have been starving for all this time. Given the later is foreshadowing of my career, I will in a way have monopolized the market as I would be the only one capable of delivering a product until one of my fellow bourgeoisie beige designers formulated something of standing equivalent value.

At the same time, I feel as though this general unenthusiasm of clothing by the designers has steered fashion away from art. Slowly, fashion diverges from a vehicle of transmitting intellect and instead becomes yet another depository of recognizable, monotonous things-you-wear-because-you’re-expected-to. I say that this is a far cry from real art. Art should challenge and force people to define, if not challenge their ideologies (and if it’s aesthetically pleasing, all the better!). There is nothing groundbreaking about a pencil skirt and the more it is brought back, the chances diminish.

Art in itself is the one thing which is unquantifiable in society. Of course everything is subject to personal bias but it is ultimately the role of art to invoke response based on ones experiences and values. This is the one area which conventional fact holds no value, where there is no right, no wrong. The abandonment of logic, the trial of meaning. Only you and art.

To me, art has rapidly evolved into something very different than what it had initially meant to me. Art has always been about exploring the crevasse which one can not probe and formulate with logic alone. Up until taking Art 20 IB, I had always placed a particular importance on the visual quality of art alone. However as I was running on an artistic “stuck”, I soon found myself relying on a higher level of intellect invested in each piece to find success. In doing this, I found that my work could reach a greater audience by incorporating the introduction of critical questions to my work to gain more than a shallow acknowledgement from the viewer and invoke a real response.

Content aside, my career goals should become more available to me as I’ve been accepted into the Ryerson University school of Fashion. My decision was based just as much on their scholarly reputation as it is my desire to network. Toronto (being Canada’s fashion capital) is oozing with opportunities for prospective fashion designers to enter the field in an environment which is supporting of the industry. From the graduating fashion collection, I would hope for my work to catch the eye of a company where I could put my talent to work in a way which would give me a taste of the structure of a larger design label. This would however, not be a permanent career setting for me as ultimately, my goal is to be an entrepreneur and steer success for my own company. Another factor which will indisputably assist me on this prospect is my desire to pursue a minor in business. With luck, this will guide me in to turning my passion into something profitable.

Success will be evident to me as a designer when I have reached my artistic goal of reinventing the fashion industry and introducing to it a new leg to stand on, without which would falter. This is to say that I want to change the way that the jaded perceive fashion and to make it something exciting and new instead of reintroducing the same styles which have had the glamour beaten out of them time after time. Although beneficial to perpetuate a business and a luxurious lifestyle, I see capital as an extraneous matter to my impending legacy. Long after net worth, inspiration will not be forgotten. Success to me as an artist is when my ideas become a valid and respectable statement wherein fashion itself can not be forgotten without mention of my name.

^* - No, not really.