NARRATIVES OF A DESIGNER’S COLLECTION: FASHION SHOWS AND ARTISTIC APPLICATIONS

Fashion weeks are of significant importance since in addition to new designs to present, within those weeks a fashion shows’ effect sometimes moves ahead of the designs. When collections are completed, fashion designers introduce them through the “fashion show,” a field used to present their collection ideas in an impressive and striking manner. Through this form, the designer employs performative presentation to help put across the intellectual message, the allure of a fashionable creation, or to mediate diverse creations in a visual way as a collection. Fashion shows have a strong impact due to the atmosphere created which is surrounded by music, video art, performance and stage design. These 20-25 minute shows represent the whole collection through the background idea of the collection and designer’s inner world, by using colors, textures, stories, forms and visuals. Thus, an artistic approach is key when designing a show in order to reveal the collection’s idea in its most relevant form. The aim of this paper is to examine how fashion shows are curated by artistic applications and to reveal the ways of narrating stories which are not written but are conveyed to communities through performative presentations. In this respect, an interpretative approach was adopted and related artistic applications from contemporary examples held between 2013 and 2018 were analyzed as part of narrating a collection. The finding of this study is that the audience has gained a new role as becoming participants in the fashion shows themselves with the opportunities offered by technological developments which creates new meanings for the fashion shows. It is understood that the function of fashion shows is now changing from a means of promotional to audience communication.