The dialectical nature of Cindy Sherman’s fashion photographs | Intellect Skip to content
1981
  1. Home
  2. A-Z Publications
  3. Critical Studies in Fashion & Beauty
  4. Volume 11, Issue 2
  5. Article
Volume 11, Issue 2
  • ISSN: 2040-4417
  • E-ISSN: 2040-4425

Abstract

This article seeks to interrogate the increasingly prevalent consideration of fashion photographs as ‘artworks’, independent of their commercial function. Using Cindy Sherman’s fashion photographs as a case study, I argue that they cannot be read either as a straightforward subversion of the fashion industry or, conversely, as totally subservient to it. While most of the writings about these works have focused on the ways in which they interrogate media constructions of feminine beauty ideals, the reasons for their embrace by the fashion industry have been largely neglected. I seek to address this lacuna by arguing that the challenging nature of Sherman’s fashion photographs, far from being antithetical to their commercial function, is precisely their source of appeal to the fashion industry. Her images are sought after by the fashion world, not because they adhere to the promotional tropes conventionally seen in fashion advertising but because they seek to distance themselves from them. This paradox can be explained by the fact that the economic success of elite industries such as rests increasingly on their ability to promote themselves as being ‘above’ commerce. It is this double-edged nature of her fashion photographs that enables them to operate simultaneously as critical interrogations of feminine ideals of beauty in an art world context, and as promotional tools within the fashion industry.

© 2020 Intellect Ltd
Loading

Article metrics loading...

/content/journals/10.1386/csfb_00013_1
2020-12-01
2024-04-20
Loading full text...

Full text loading...

References

  1. Bailey, Glenda. ( 2016;), ‘ Editor’s letter. ’, Harper’s Bazaar, 3641, March, p. 184.
     [Google Scholar]
  2. Bakhtin, Mikhail. ( 1968), Rabelais and His World, Cambridge, MA:: MIT Press;.
     [Google Scholar]
  3. Benjamin, Walter. ( 1977), Understanding Brecht, London:: New Left Books;.
     [Google Scholar]
  4. Bourdieu, Pierre. ( 1993a;), ‘ Haute couture and haute culture. ’, in P. Bourdieu. (ed.), Sociology in Question, London:: Sage;, pp. 132–38.
     [Google Scholar]
  5. Bourdieu, Pierre. ( 1993b;), ‘ The production of belief: Contribution to an economy of symbolic goods. ’, in P. Bourdieu. (ed.), The Field of Cultural Production, Cambridge:: Polity Press;, pp. 74–111.
     [Google Scholar]
  6. Brown, Laura. ( 2016;), ‘ Cindy Sherman: Street-style star. ’, Harper’s Bazaar, 3641, March, pp. 454–500, https://www.harpersbazaar.com/culture/features/a14005/cindy-sherman-0316/. Accessed 3 June 2020.
     [Google Scholar]
  7. Brownlie, Douglas,, Daza-LeTouze, Claudia,, Hewer, Paul, and Kerrigan, Finola. ( 2011;), ‘ “Spinning” Warhol: Celebrity brand theoretics and the logic of the celebrity brand. ’, Journal of Marketing Management, 27:13–14, pp. 1504–24.
     [Google Scholar]
  8. Buttrose, Ellie. ( 2016;), ‘ A prop for a bad feminist. ’, in C. Saines. (ed.), Cindy Sherman, Brisbane:: Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art;, pp. 30–37.
     [Google Scholar]
  9. Church Gibson, Pamela. ( 2018;), ‘ Cindy Sherman in a new millenium: Fashion, feminism, art and ageing. ’, Australian Feminist Studies, 33:98, pp. 481–97.
     [Google Scholar]
  10. Cohen, Ari Seth. ( n.d.), Advanced Style, https://www.advanced.style/. Accessed 3 June 2020.
     [Google Scholar]
  11. Craik, Jennifer. ( 1994), The Face of Fashion, London and New York:: Routledge;.
     [Google Scholar]
  12. Criqui, Jean-Pierre. ( 2006;), ‘ The lady vanishes. ’, in R. Durand. (ed.), Cindy Sherman, Paris:: Flammarion – Jeu de Paume;.
     [Google Scholar]
  13. Drucker, Johanna. ( 2006), Sweet Dreams: Contemporary Art and Complicity, Chicago:: University of Chicago Press;.
     [Google Scholar]
  14. Durand, Régis. (ed.) ( 2006), Cindy Sherman, Paris:: Flammarion – Jeu de Paume;.
     [Google Scholar]
  15. Dyer, Richard. ( 1998), Stars, London:: British Film Institute;.
     [Google Scholar]
  16. Goldman, Robert. ( 1992), Reading Ads Socially, London and New York:: Routledge;.
     [Google Scholar]
  17. Granata, Francesca. ( 2017), Experimental Fashion: Performance Art, Carnival and the Grotesque Body, London and New York:: I.B. Tauris;.
     [Google Scholar]
  18. Gundle, Stephen. ( 2008), Glamour, Oxford:: Oxford University Press;.
     [Google Scholar]
  19. Hall-Duncan, Nancy. ( 1979), The History of Fashion Photography, New York:: International Museum of Photography and Alpine Book Company;.
     [Google Scholar]
  20. Jermyn, Deborah. ( 2016;), ‘ Pretty past-it? Interrogating the post-feminist makeover of ageing, style and fashion. ’, Feminist Media Studies, 16:4, pp. 573–89.
     [Google Scholar]
  21. Koda, Harold. ( 2009), The Model as Muse: Embodying Fashion, New York:: The Metropolitan Museum of Art;.
     [Google Scholar]
  22. Lipovetsky, Gilles. ( 2002;), ‘ More than fashion. ’, in U. Lehmann. (ed.), Chic Clicks: Creativity and Commerce in Contemporary Fashion Photography, Boston and New York:: Institute of Contemporary Art with Hatje Cantz;.
     [Google Scholar]
  23. Leonard, Robert. ( 2016;), ‘ Everything and its opposite. ’, in C. Saines. (ed.), Cindy Sherman, Brisbane:: Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art;, pp. 38–47.
     [Google Scholar]
  24. Loreck, Hanne. ( 2002;), ‘ De/constructing fashion/fashions of deconstruction: Cindy Sherman’s fashion photographs. ’, Fashion Theory, 6:3, pp. 255–76.
     [Google Scholar]
  25. Mulvey, Laura. ( 1996;), ‘ Cosmetics and abjection: Cindy Sherman 1977-87. ’, in L. Mulvey. (ed.), Fetishism and Curiosity, Bloomington and Indianapolis:: Indiana University Press;, pp. 65–76.
     [Google Scholar]
  26. Nelson, Karin. ( 2010;), ‘ Balenciaga through her prism. ’, New York Times, 5 September, ST. 3 .
     [Google Scholar]
  27. Nickerson, Camilla, and Wakefield, Neville. (eds) ( 1998), Fashion: Photography of the Nineties, New York:: Scalo;.
     [Google Scholar]
  28. Respini, Eva. (ed.) ( 2012), Cindy Sherman, New York:: Museum of Modern Art;.
     [Google Scholar]
  29. Rhodes, Kate. ( 2008;), ‘ The elegance of the everyday: Nobodies in contemporary fashion photography. ’, in E. Shinkle. (ed.), Fashion as Photograph: Viewing and Reviewing Images of Fashion, London and New York:: I.B. Tauris;, pp. 200–13.
     [Google Scholar]
  30. Saines, Chris. (ed.) ( 2016), Cindy Sherman, Brisbane:: QAGOMA;.
     [Google Scholar]
  31. Smedley, Elliot. ( 2000;), ‘ Escaping to reality: Fashion photography in the 1990s. ’, in S. Bruzzi, and P. Church Gibson. (eds), Fashion Cultures: Theories, Explorations and Analysis, London and New York:: Routledge;, pp. 143–56.
     [Google Scholar]
  32. Smith, Elizabeth. ( 1997;), ‘ The sleep of reason produces monsters. ’, in A. Cruz,, E. Smith, and A. Jones. (eds), Cindy Sherman: Retrospective, New York and London:: Thames & Hudson;.
     [Google Scholar]
  33. Stallabrass, Julian. ( 2004), Art Incorporated: The Story of Contemporary Art, Oxford:: Oxford University Press;.
     [Google Scholar]
  34. Svendsen, Lars. ( 2006), Fashion: A Philosophy, London:: Reaktion Books;.
     [Google Scholar]
  35. Townsend, Chris. ( 2002), Rapture: Art’s Seduction by Fashion, London:: Thames & Hudson;.
     [Google Scholar]
  36. Tseëlon, Efrat. ( 1995), The Masque of Femininity, London:: Sage;.
     [Google Scholar]
  37. Twigg, Julia. ( 2010;), ‘ How does vogue negotiate age?: Fashion, the body and the older woman. ’, Fashion Theory, 14:4, pp. 471–90.
     [Google Scholar]
  38. Wada, Amanda M. ( 2015;), ‘ Cindy Sherman: Fashion take-offs. ’, unpublished master’s thesis, Long Beach:: California State University;.
     [Google Scholar]
  39. Wallace, Miranda. ( 2016;), ‘ Through a glass, darkly. ’, in C. Saines. (ed.), Cindy Sherman, Brisbane:: QAGOMA;, pp. 16–28.
     [Google Scholar]
  40. Williams, Val. ( 2008;), ‘ A heady relationship: Fashion photography and the museum, 1979 to the present. ’, Fashion Theory, 12:2, pp. 197–218.
     [Google Scholar]
  41. Negrin, Llewellyn. ( 2020;), ‘ The dialectical nature of Cindy Sherman’s fashion photographs. ’, Critical Studies in Fashion & Beauty, 11:2, pp. 129–152, doi: https://doi.org/10.1386/csfb_00013_1
     [Google Scholar]
http://instance.metastore.ingenta.com/content/journals/10.1386/csfb_00013_1
Loading
The dialectical nature of Cindy Sherman’s fashion photographs
Critical Studies in Fashion & Beauty 11, 129 (2020); https://doi.org/10.1386/csfb_00013_1
/content/journals/10.1386/csfb_00013_1
/content/journals/10.1386/csfb_00013_1
Loading

Data & Media loading...

  • Article Type: Article
Keyword(s): advertising; anti-glamour; art and fashion; Cindy Sherman; fashion industry; fashion photography

Most Cited Most Cited RSS feed

This is a required field
Please enter a valid email address
Approval was a success
Invalid data
An error occurred
Approval was partially successful, following selected items could not be processed due to error