{"id":66060,"date":"2018-06-07T17:04:25","date_gmt":"2018-06-07T15:04:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/?p=66060"},"modified":"2018-06-07T17:04:25","modified_gmt":"2018-06-07T15:04:25","slug":"antwerp-2018-graduates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/de\/article\/antwerp-2018-graduates\/","title":{"rendered":"The 5 Antwerp Fashion Grads to Watch Out For"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"For the fashion students at Antwerp\u2019s Royal Academy, the graduate show is time to reap the rewards of endless efforts, sleepless nights and countless disappointments.\u00a0 Tailored experiments of the first-year Bachelors, historical costumes and collections of the second-year students and the full-fledged collections of the BA graduates are traditionally followed by the Masters\u2019 showcasing of their work. And, shaped by one of the most prestigious fashion departments in the world, masters they’ve truly become.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Out of this year\u2019s eight tour-de-force MA collections, we’ve selected our five favourites \u2013 and it wasn’t an easy task. <\/span><\/p>\n

Federica Di Leo<\/span><\/strong><\/h1>\n

\"\"The exquisitely beautiful but spiky fuchsias that appear in Federica Di Leo’s prints are ubiquitous in Sicily and\u00a0<\/span>a fitting symbol for the island\u2019s difficult history. Sicily-born herself, Di Leo dedicated her collection, Rita, to Rita Atria, a teenager, who in the early 1990s was a witness in the police investigation against the Mafia. Rita\u2019s story is tragic: coming from a Sicilian Mafioso family herself, she decided to testify against the Mafia members after her father and brother were killed. She was put under the police protection and relocated to a small house in the outskirts of Rome where she lived in hiding. After the judge who protected her was killed, the girl committed suicide realising that she was in danger, too. <\/span><\/p>\n

Di Leo translated Rita\u2019s story into a poignant and imaginative collection where draped clothes and hoods symbolised her seclusion and fear while in hiding.\u00a0Rita\u2019s mother, who saw her daughter\u2019s testimony as a betrayal, smashed Rita’s tomb with a hammer \u2014 an event alluded to by the hammers models carried in their hands. Despite the grave theme, Di Leo\u2019s clothes are delightfully wearable. The body-hugging dress, for instance, decorated with a graphic \u201cNO MAFIA\u201d print, most definitely has our seal of approval.<\/span><\/p>\n

Stefan Kartchev<\/span><\/h1>\n

\"\"Stefan Kartchev\u2019s riff on the now-trendy East European culture is impressive. Entitled \u201cAmbivalence\u201d, his menswear collection is accordingly multifaceted and presents an unlikely partnership of sporty and ecclesiastical motifs. For his final-year collection, the Bulgaria-born designer found inspiration in the religious advertising that peppers his home country. The voluminous shapes in the collection draw on orthodox liturgical wear, while the asymmetrical details and sports fabrics create a futuristic, almost dystopian mood. The clothes are blotched with inscriptions borrowed from TV ads\u00a0<\/span>(the effect is surreally ironic) and are made to resemble banners. \u201cPeople in Eastern Europe are still hoping for their faith to bring them a better future,\u201d commented Kartchev, whose catwalk presentation had an ominously cultish feel.<\/span><\/p>\n

Kjell De Meersman\u00a0<\/span><\/h1>\n

\"\"Last year, for his third-year BA collection, Kjell De Meersman playfully translated his six personal party-time personas into an array of eye-catching garments. In his MA work, party motifs are palpable too \u2014 against the backdrop of a gigantic disco-ball that dominated the runway, the designer showed\u00a0<\/span>glamorous, revealing looks in latex and glitter. <\/span><\/p>\n

Named after a female deity worshipped in parts of Africa, the collection celebrates empowered femininity. Inspired by the designer\u2019s banker mother, it has several formal looks finished with ripped details to disconcerting and subversive effect. \u201cI\u2019m one of the few students who do eveningwear here,\u201d remarks De Meersman, who seems to be in favour of opulently sexy womenswear. In addition to twelve women\u2019s looks (all latex and fur) the designer showed four for men: to demonstrate \u201cthe importance of being capable of doing both\u201d, as he explained. His men, however, dressed as they were in distressed, torn suits, look purposefully battered to render them \u201can accessory for once\u201d. <\/span><\/p>\n

The collection, all in all, oscillates artfully between the sexy, the cheeky and the aggressive. Some models wore wimple-like headgear made of latex, which made them resemble nuns ready for a party. As for the fur pieces, well: \u201cI went to the woods and shot up some of my pieces with a hunting rifle,\u201d told De Meersman \u2014 a practice the SLEEK team in no way endorses.<\/span><\/p>\n

Shayli Harrison<\/span><\/h1>\n

\"\"\u201cShe is an Australian, white-trash goddess with a fetish for mother earth,\u201d says Shayli Harrison of the character she created for her graduate collection. Harrison, who spent most of her childhood in Western Australia and grew up \u201csurrounded by native bush-land near the ocean\u201d, offered an alternative view on our attitude towards nature. \u201cIt\u2019s about treating nature as your lover,\u201d she explained. \u201cOr looking at what you and nature have as a relationship. Perhaps, in that way, if we see it as something reciprocal, we might stop abusing it.\u201d Harrison translated her vision into a lyrical and well-balanced collection, full of airy fabrics, voluminous shapes and asymmetric details. The captivating prints incorporated paintings by Shaily and her grandmother, while the shoes \u2013 frilly and layered \u2013 were quirky versions of the classic cowboy boot. The designer\u2019s catwalk presentation captured her concept perfectly, the models resembling river fairies replete with green hair and legs smeared with mud.<\/span><\/p>\n

Gennaro Genni Velotti<\/span><\/strong><\/h1>\n

\"\"Gennaro Genni Velotti’s collection was a beautiful ode to freedom and femininity, drawing on his native Naples and Martin Parr’s images of beach life. Although that may sound somewhat incongruous, Velotti managed to bring his different inspirations together to form a powerful, well curated collection that boasted a tinge of early ’90s trashy glamour. <\/span><\/p>\n

The plethora of broad-shouldered, monochrome jackets defy the conservative view of femininity, proving \u201cthat a woman can be a man, and a father and a mother,\u201d said the designer. Gennaro warmed his collection up with multiple references to Naples: the wrinkled, sturdy shirts were made to resemble wet clothes, hanging from a laundry line, body-hugging jumpsuits, accessorised with mesh, looked like sunburnt skin.The result was a whimsical celebration of life by the seaside with a nod to the stereotypes present in Parr’s inimitable oeuvre.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 
\n <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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