Art, Fashion, and Anti-consumption

Abstract

Contemporary artists deal with many forms of social interaction, including consumption. In this commentary, I walk the fine line between art and fashion, distant sisters in history. Referring to fashion projects presented at dOCUMENTA(13), I show that art’s aesthetic language may speak against fashion’s ultimate commercial meaning. The aesthetic perspective is important because reasons against consumption are not merely intellectual. They include many emotional and symbolic forms of knowing, in this case about self-degrading styling concepts that are possible only through unsustainable production by global fast fashion retailers such as H&M, Zara, and Forever 21 and other cheap fashion brands. Referring to art critics’ assessments and aesthetic theory, I interpret my observations through theories of anti-consumption. Included is a review of Elizabeth Cline’s critical book Overdressed: The Shockingly High Cost of Cheap Fashion that reveals some of the motifs of the fast fashion industry resonating in contemporary artworks and investigates opportunities to reject, resist, and reclaim fashion.