Artist Statement:
Illustrating fashion from two various experiences, I have created a garment capturing the predetermined sizes the fashion industry has fabricated. As formerly being a plus sized girl and currently as a straight sized girl, I’ve seen both ends of how the industry assumes these women should dress. I combined clothing from the time I was plus sized, baggy and loose fitting with a dress that I had bought once I lost weight, short and skin tight. It creates a dynamic between the two pieces of clothing, as one is noticeably larger than the other, but unifies them at the end to show the result. Two things that are part of what physically, either past or present, makes me into who I am today. I wanted to create a thought provoking experience by asking the viewer about the differences in clothing that caters to plus sized girls versus straight sized girls. It makes them think about how they’re two completely different playing fields in the fashion industry when they should be thought of as one.
Process:
Originally, for my garment I wanted to create a babydoll styled dress with a sheer see-through material. Before I lost weight, I would wear this style of dress because of the way they were good at hiding my stomach. Making it out of a sheer material would signify that I’m no longer afraid to hide what’s underneath, my body as it is today. To accompany this see through dress, I was going to wear a black skin tight bodysuit underneath. This route for the project came off as too literal though, so I had to change the idea a little, with still keeping the fact that I wanted to signify these two different bodies that I was/am in.
As I got deeper into conceptualizing, I got clothing that I used to wear, and clothing that fits me now, and set them all out side by side. I began to think of ways to combine the two types of clothing to create an interesting garment that got the point I wanted to portray across. As I did this, there was things I noticed about the clothing and its differences. The plus sized clothing was all loose fitting and quite frumpy to be honest. The clothing made for straight sized (sizes 0-12) girls is always made to be accentuating features.
This observation inspired my research paper for Seminar. I wrote about many aspects of plus sized fashion in the industry, how designers perceive plus sized girls, how plus sized women as well as models feel, and talked about brands that are either lacking or leading in the production of plus sized clothing.
I finally had come to an idea for my garment for Studio. I had juxtaposed a tiny bodycon dress that is my current size with a pair of pants from before I had lost weight. It was a large transformation for me. The viewer could see them on top of one another, but could also see two parts of my transformation that alleviated my biggest insecurity and makes me the more confident woman who I am today.
For the performance aspect of the project, I wanted to touch upon peoples perception of plus sized girls. People always make assumptions about bodies that are different from theirs and one of the largest ones is with eating habits. Its a huge generalization to make about a group of people with a similar body type. It was originally suggested to me that I sit and eat unhealthy food for the performance aspect. But, that action wasn’t aligned with the point I wanted to make at all. So instead, I sat with a bag of apples. A generally healthy food, and flipping the false perception put on bigger women that they all are unhealthy, because that is just not true. I believe this was effective in showing that you can be healthy no matter what body you’re in.
Overall, I think both the Seminar and Studio projects for this bridge were both successful in showing and explaining how plus sized fashion is looked at, how companies need to be more inclusive of all bodies, and how I took a big insecurity of mine and now find it personally empowering.
