In the visual arts , style is a "... distinctive manner which permits the grouping of works into related categories" or "... any distinctive, and therefore recognizable, way in which an act is performed or an artifact made or ought to be performed and made". Style refers to the visual appearance of a work of art that relates to other works with similar aesthetic roots, by the same artist, or from the same period, training, location, "school", art movement or archaeological culture : "The notion of style has long been historian's principal mode of classifying works of art".
105-513: Chic ( / ˈ ʃ iː k / ; French: [ʃik] ), meaning "stylish" or "smart", is an element of fashion . It was originally a French word . Chic is a French word , established in English since at least the 1870s. Early references in English dictionaries classified it as slang and New Zealand -born lexicographer Eric Partridge noted, with reference to its colloquial meaning, that it
210-470: A 13th-century poem by Guillaume de Lorris advising men that "handsome clothes and handsome accessories improve a man a great deal". Fashion scholar Susan B. Kaiser states that everyone is "forced to appear", unmediated before others. Everyone is evaluated by their attire, and evaluation includes the consideration of colors , materials, silhouette, and how garments appear on the body. Garments identical in style and material also appear different depending on
315-528: A contrasting stripe down the leg, ugg boots , floral print maxi skirts , Y2K inspired platform shoes , chunky red rain boots , shimmery jumpsuits , knitted dresses, leather pilot jackets with faux fur collars, skirts with bold contrasting vertical stripes, trouser suits with bootcut legs, jeans with glittery heart or star-shaped details, chunky white or black sandals, and zebra print tote bags . Big, oversized garments were often made from translucent materials and featured cutouts intended to expose
420-426: A degree of stylization is very often found in details, and especially figures or other features at a small scale, such as people or trees etc. in the distant background even of a large work. But this is not stylization intended to be noticed by the viewer, except on close examination. Drawings , modelli , and other sketches not intended as finished works for sale will also very often stylize. "Stylized" may mean
525-476: A dinner jacket and to accessorize in new ways. Some men's styles blended the sensuality and expressiveness, and the growing gay-rights movement and an emphasis on youth allowed for a new freedom to experiment with style and with fabrics such as wool crepe, which had previously been associated with women's attire. The four major current fashion capitals are acknowledged to be New York City ( Manhattan ), Paris , Milan , and London , which are all headquarters to
630-419: A grass stain, but to others, they display purity, freshness, and summer. Fashion is unique, self-fulfilling and may be a key part of someone's identity. Similarly to art, the aims of a person's choices in fashion are not necessarily to be liked by everyone, but instead to be an expression of personal taste. A person's personal style functions as a "societal formation always combining two opposite principles. It
735-531: A leading art historian of 16th-century Italian painting and mentee of Sydney Joseph Freedberg (1914–1997), who invented the term, was criticised by a reviewer of her After Raphael: Painting in Central Italy in the Sixteenth Century for her "fundamental flaw" in continuing to use this and other terms, despite an apologetic "Note on style labels" at the beginning of the book and a promise to keep their use to
840-518: A long period without significant changes. In eighth-century Moorish Spain , the musician Ziryab introduced to Córdoba sophisticated clothing styles based on seasonal and daily fashions from his native Baghdad , modified by his inspiration. Similar changes in fashion occurred in the 11th century in the Middle East following the arrival of the Turks , who introduced clothing styles from Central Asia and
945-425: A marked tendency to revive at intervals "classic" styles from the past. In critical analysis of the visual arts, the style of a work of art is typically treated as distinct from its iconography , which covers the subject and the content of the work, though for Jas Elsner this distinction is "not, of course, true in any actual example; but it has proved rhetorically extremely useful". Classical art criticism and
1050-502: A minimum. A rare recent attempt to create a theory to explain the process driving changes in artistic style, rather than just theories of how to describe and categorize them, is by the behavioural psychologist Colin Martindale , who has proposed an evolutionary theory based on Darwinian principles. However this cannot be said to have gained much support among art historians. Traditional art history has also placed great emphasis on
1155-446: A more specific meaning, referring to visual depictions that use simplified ways of representing objects or scenes that do not attempt a full, precise and accurate representation of their visual appearance ( mimesis or " realistic "), preferring an attractive or expressive overall depiction. More technically, it has been defined as "the decorative generalization of figures and objects by means of various conventional techniques, including
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#17328697757371260-626: A number of rich traditions; though these were often drawn upon by Western designers, Asian clothing styles gained considerable influence in the early- to mid-2000s. China Chinese fashion remained constantly changing over the centuries. In China, throughout the Tang Dynasty (618–907), women wore extravagant attire to demonstrate prosperity. Mongol men of the Yuan Dynasty (1279–1368) wore loose robes; horsemen sported shorter robes, trousers, and boots to provide ease when horseback riding. The leaders of
1365-581: A profit. A fashion trend signifies a specific look or expression that is spread across a population at a specific time and place. A trend is considered a more ephemeral look, not defined by the seasons when collections are released by the fashion industry. A trend can thus emerge from street style , across cultures, and from influencers and other celebrities . Fashion trends are influenced by several factors, including cinema, celebrities, climate, creative explorations, innovations, designs, political, economic, social, and technological. Examining these factors
1470-541: A sign of provincial culture and later a badge of the conservative peasant. Although tailors and dressmakers were no doubt responsible for many innovations, and the textile industry indeed led many trends, the history of fashion design is generally understood to date from 1858 when the English-born Charles Frederick Worth opened the first authentic haute couture house in Paris. The Haute house
1575-428: A society according to age, social class, generation, occupation, and geography, and may also vary over time. The terms fashionista and fashion victim refer to someone who slavishly follows current fashions. In the early 2000s, Asian fashion influences became increasingly significant in local and global markets. Countries such as China, Japan, India, and Pakistan have traditionally had large textile industries with
1680-432: A specially developed algorithm and placed them in similar style categories to human art historians. The analysis involved the sampling of more than 4,000 visual features per work of art. Apps such as Deep Art Effects can turn photos into art-like images claimed to be in the style of painters such as Van Gogh . With the development of sophisticated text-to-image AI art software , using specifiable art styles has become
1785-534: A style, as style only results from choices made by a maker. Whether the artist makes a conscious choice of style, or can identify his own style, hardly matters. Artists in recent developed societies tend to be highly conscious of their own style, arguably over-conscious, whereas for earlier artists stylistic choices were probably "largely unselfconscious". Most stylistic periods are identified and defined later by art historians, but artists may choose to define and name their own style. The names of most older styles are
1890-517: Is a depressing affair indeed". According to James Elkins "In the later 20th century criticisms of style were aimed at further reducing the Hegelian elements of the concept while retaining it in a form that could be more easily controlled". Meyer Schapiro , James Ackerman , Ernst Gombrich and George Kubler ( The Shape of Time: Remarks on the History of Things , 1962) have made notable contributions to
1995-536: Is a dominant factor in their valuation for the art market , above all for works in the Western tradition since the Renaissance. The identification of individual style in works is "essentially assigned to a group of specialists in the field known as connoisseurs ", a group who centre in the art trade and museums, often with tensions between them and the community of academic art historians. The exercise of connoisseurship
2100-427: Is a socially acceptable and secure way to distinguish oneself from others and, at the same time, it satisfies the individual's need for social adaptation and imitation." While philosopher Immanuel Kant believed that fashion "has nothing to do with genuine judgements of taste", and was instead "a case of unreflected and 'blind' imitation", sociologist Georg Simmel thought of fashion as something that "helped overcome
2205-469: Is a term used interchangeably to describe the creation of clothing , footwear , accessories , cosmetics , and jewellery of different cultural aesthetics and their mix and match into outfits that depict distinctive ways of dressing ( styles and trends ) as signifiers of social status , self-expression , and group belonging. As a multifaceted term, fashion describes an industry , styles , aesthetics , and trends. The term 'fashion' originates from
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#17328697757372310-454: Is called a PEST analysis . Fashion forecasters can use this information to help determine the growth or decline of a particular trend. People's minds as well as their perceptions and consciousness are constantly changing. Fads are inherently social, are constantly evolving in a contradiction between the old and the new, and are in a sense easily influenced by those around them, and therefore also begin to imitate constantly. Continuing on from
2415-560: Is considerable evidence in Ming China of rapidly changing fashions in Chinese clothing . In imperial China, clothing were not only an embodiment of freedom and comfort or used to cover the body or protect against the cold or used for decorative purposes; it was also regulated by strong sumptuary laws which was based on strict social hierarchy system and the ritual system of the Chinese society. It
2520-416: Is easier to replicate by following a set of rules than style in figurative art such as painting. Terms originated to describe architectural periods were often subsequently applied to other areas of the visual arts, and then more widely still to music, literature and the general culture. In architecture stylistic change often follows, and is made possible by, the discovery of new techniques or materials, from
2625-425: Is it clear that any such idea was articulated in antiquity ... Pliny was attentive to changes in ways of art-making, but he presented such changes as driven by technology and wealth. Vasari, too, attributes the strangeness and, in his view the deficiencies, of earlier art to lack of technological know-how and cultural sophistication. Giorgio Vasari set out a hugely influential but much-questioned account of
2730-696: Is largely a matter of subjective impressions that are hard to analyse, but also a matter of knowing details of technique and the "hand" of different artists. Giovanni Morelli (1816 – 1891) pioneered the systematic study of the scrutiny of diagnostic minor details that revealed artists' scarcely conscious shorthand and conventions for portraying, for example, ears or hands, in Western old master paintings. His techniques were adopted by Bernard Berenson and others, and have been applied to sculpture and many other types of art, for example by Sir John Beazley to Attic vase painting . Personal techniques can be important in analysing individual style. Though artists' training
2835-507: Is more aspirational; inspired by art and culture, and in most cases, reserved for the economic elite . However, New York's fashion calendar hosts Couture Fashion Week, which strives for a more equitable and inclusive mission. Fashion is also a source of art, allowing people to display their unique tastes, sensibilities, and styles. Different fashion designers are influenced by outside stimuli and reflect this inspiration in their work. For example, Gucci 's 'stained green' jeans may look like
2940-418: Is more often used to mean the overall style and atmosphere of a work, especially complex works such as paintings, that cannot so easily be subject to precise analysis. It is a somewhat outdated term in academic art history, avoided because it is imprecise. When used it is often in the context of imitations of the individual style of an artist, and it is one of the hierarchy of discreet or diplomatic terms used in
3045-562: Is often attributed with the invention of the German word Zeitgeist , but he never actually used the word, although in Lectures on the Philosophy of History , he uses the phrase der Geist seiner Zeit (the spirit of his time), writing that "no man can surpass his own time, for the spirit of his time is also his own spirit." Constructing schemes of the period styles of historic art and architecture
3150-652: Is recognized as the national dress of India. Japan For Japan, the people during the Meiji period (1868–1912) widely incorporated Western styles into Japanese fashion, which is considered to be a remarkable transformation for the Japanese vogue. They extensively adopted the style and practices of Western cultures.The upper classes wore more extravagant pieces of clothing like luxurious patterned silks and adorned themselves with fancy sashes. Women also started wearing Western dresses in public instead of their traditional Kimono . Most of
3255-486: Is seen as usually dynamic, in most periods always changing by a gradual process, though the speed of this varies greatly, from the very slow development in style typical of prehistoric art or Ancient Egyptian art to the rapid changes in Modern art styles. Style often develops in a series of jumps, with relatively sudden changes followed by periods of slower development. After dominating academic discussion in art history in
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3360-564: Is usually rather pretentious, but sometimes merely facetious – Micky Dolenz of The Monkees described the American Indian -style suit he wore at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 as "très chic" . Über -chic is roughly the mock-German equivalent: "Like his clubs, it's super-modern, über-chic, yet still comfortable". The opposite of "chic" is unchic : "the then uncrowded, unchic little port of St Tropez ". Over
3465-543: The Genroku period and the later centuries of the Edo period (1603–1867), during which a time clothing trends switched from flashy and expensive displays of wealth to subdued and subverted ones. The myth on the lack of fashion in what was considered the Orient was related to Western Imperialism also often accompanied Orientalism , and European imperialism was especially at its highest in
3570-650: The Qing Dynasty (1644–1911) maintained Manchu dress, while establishing new garments for officials; while foot binding —originally introduced in the 10th century—was not preserved, women of this era were expected to wear particular heels that pushed them to take on a ladylike walk. Then, in the 1920s, qipao was in vogue and the style consisted of stand collars, trumpet sleeves, straight silhouettes and short side slits. Since then, designers started to move into Western fashion like fur coats and cloaks and body-hugging dresses with long side slits as qipao became more popular. In
3675-399: The art trade for the relationship between a work for sale and that of a well-known artist, with "Manner of Rembrandt " suggesting a distanced relationship between the style of the work and Rembrandt's own style. The "Explanation of Cataloguing Practice" of the auctioneers Christie's ' explains that " Manner of ... " in their auction catalogues means "In our opinion a work executed in
3780-520: The maximalist and 1980s influences of the early 2020s , vibrant coloured clothing had made a comeback for women in America, France, China, Korea, and Ukraine by the spring of 2023. This style, sometimes referred to as " dopamine dressing", featured long skirts and belted maxi dresses with thigh splits, lots of gold and pearl jewelry, oversized striped cardigan sweaters , multicoloured silk skirts with seashell or floral print, strappy sandals, pants with
3885-402: The mid to late 1970s , Western shirts with pearl snaps in denim or bright madras plaid made a comeback, and sometimes featured contrasting yokes and cuffs with intricate embroidery. Moccasins , stonewash denim waistcoats with decorative fringes, preppy loafers, navy blue suits and sportcoats , straight leg jeans instead of the skinny jeans fashionable from the late 2000s until
3990-404: The 1950s and 60s, ‘Lenin coats’ with double lines of buttons, slanting pockets and a belt came into vogue among Chinese men. India In India, it has been common for followers of different religions to wear corresponding pieces of clothing . During the 15th century, Muslim and Hindu women wore notably different articles of clothing. This is also seen in many other Eastern world countries. In
4095-505: The 1960s, when designers such as Pierre Cardin and Rudi Gernreich created garments, such as stretch jersey tunics or leggings, meant to be worn by both males and females. The impact of unisex wearability expanded more broadly to encompass various themes in fashion, including androgyny, mass-market retail, and conceptual clothing. The fashion trends of the 1970s, such as sheepskin jackets, flight jackets, duffel coats, and unstructured clothing, influenced men to attend social gatherings without
4200-432: The 19th and early 20th centuries, so-called "style art history" has come under increasing attack in recent decades, and many art historians now prefer to avoid stylistic classifications where they can. Any piece of art is in theory capable of being analysed in terms of style; neither periods nor artists can avoid having a style, except by complete incompetence, and conversely natural objects or sights cannot be said to have
4305-453: The 19th century. In the 19th century time, Europeans described China in binary opposition to Europe, describing China as "lacking in fashion" among many other things, while Europeans deliberately placed themselves in a superior position when they would compare themselves to the Chinese as well as to other countries in Asia : Latent orientalism is an unconscious, untouchable certainty about what
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4410-656: The East Asia, in India, and Middle East, where the perceived lack of fashion were associated with offensive remarks on the Asian social and political systems: I confess that the unchanging fashions of the Turks and other Eastern peoples do not attract me. It seems that their fashions tend to preserve their stupid despotism. Additionally, there is a long history of fashion in West Africa . Cloth
4515-453: The English word denoting something "in style" dates only to the 16th century. Other words exist related to concepts of style and appeal that precede mode . In the 12th and 13th century Old French the concept of elegance begins to appear in the context of aristocratic preferences to enhance beauty and display refinement, and cointerie , the idea of making oneself more attractive to others by style or artifice in grooming and dress, appears in
4620-530: The Far East. Early Western travellers who visited India , Persia , Turkey , or China , would frequently remark on the absence of change in fashion in those countries. In 1609, the secretary of the Japanese shōgun bragged inaccurately to a Spanish visitor that Japanese clothing had not changed in over a thousand years. However, these conceptions of non-Western clothing undergoing little, if any, evolution are generally held to be untrue; for instance, there
4725-467: The Gothic rib vault to modern metal and reinforced concrete construction. A major area of debate in both art history and archaeology has been the extent to which stylistic change in other fields like painting or pottery is also a response to new technical possibilities, or has its own impetus to develop (the kunstwollen of Riegl), or changes in response to social and economic factors affecting patronage and
4830-661: The Latin word 'Facere,' which means 'to make,' and describes the manufacturing, mixing, and wearing of outfits adorned with specific cultural aesthetics, patterns, motifs , shapes, and cuts, allowing people to showcase their group belonging, values, meanings, beliefs, and ways of life. Given the rise in mass production of commodities and clothing at lower prices and global reach, reducing fashion's environmental impact and improving sustainability has become an urgent issue among politicians, brands, and consumers. The French word mode , meaning "fashion", dates as far back as 1482, while
4935-524: The Orient is, static and unanimous, separate, eccentric, backward, silently different, sensual, and passive. It has a tendency towards despotism and away from progress. [...] Its progress and value are judged in comparison to the West, so it is the Other. Many rigorous scholars [...] saw the Orient as a locale requiring Western attention, reconstruction, even redemption. Similar ideas were also applied to other countries in
5040-462: The Victorian era, most women did not wear blouses under their saris, which did not suit the Victorian society; however, British and Indian fashion would be influenced by each other in following decades. In the 1920s, the nationalists adopted Khadi cloth as a symbol of resistance; here, Gandhi became the face of the resistance which made people spin, weave, and wear their Khadi. Today, the salwaar-kameez
5145-583: The adoption of any style in any context, and in American English is often used for the typographic style of names, as in " AT&T is also stylized as ATT and at&t": this is a specific usage that seems to have escaped dictionaries, although it is a small extension of existing other senses of the word. In a 2012 experiment at Lawrence Technological University in Michigan, a computer analysed approximately 1,000 paintings from 34 well-known artists using
5250-590: The art historians who followed Riegl in proposing grand schemes tracing the transmission of elements of styles across great ranges in time and space. This type of art history is also known as formalism , or the study of forms or shapes in art. Semper, Wölfflin, and Frankl, and later Ackerman, had backgrounds in the history of architecture, and like many other terms for period styles, "Romanesque" and "Gothic" were initially coined to describe architectural styles , where major changes between styles can be clearer and more easy to define, not least because style in architecture
5355-512: The artist's style but of a later date". Mannerism , derived from the Italian maniera ("manner") is a specific phase of the general Renaissance style, but "manner" can be used very widely. In archaeology , despite modern techniques like radiocarbon dating , period or cultural style remains a crucial tool in the identification and dating not only of works of art but all classes of archaeological artefact , including purely functional ones (ignoring
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#17328697757375460-446: The case of images from the 15th century. Initially, changes in fashion led to a fragmentation across the upper classes of Europe of what had previously been a very similar style of dressing and the subsequent development of distinctive national styles. These national styles remained very different until a counter-movement in the 17th to 18th centuries imposed similar styles once again, mostly originating from Ancien Régime France. Though
5565-451: The chest to make it look bigger. This created the distinctive Western outline of a tailored top worn over leggings or trousers. The pace of change accelerated considerably in the following century, and women's and men's fashion, especially in the dressing and adorning of the hair, became equally complex. Art historians are, therefore, able to use fashion with confidence and precision to date images, often to within five years, particularly in
5670-549: The chest, and boxy leather reefer jackets were popular on both sides of the Atlantic. Fashion is inherently a social phenomenon . A person cannot have a fashion by oneself, but for something to be defined as fashion, there needs to be dissemination and followers. This dissemination can take several forms; from the top-down ("trickle-down") to bottom-up ("bubble up/trickle-up"), or transversally across cultures and through viral memes and media ("trickle-across"). Fashion relates to
5775-601: The clothes manufactured in Vietnam, finished in Italy, and shipped to a warehouse in the United States for distribution to retail outlets internationally. The fashion industry has for a long time been one of the largest employers in the United States, and it remains so in the 21st century. However, U.S. employment in fashion began to decline considerably as production increasingly moved overseas, especially to China. Because data regarding
5880-582: The comparative and superlative forms of chic as chicer and chicest . These are wholly English words: the French equivalents would be plus chic and le/la plus chic . Super-chic is sometimes used: "super-chic Incline bucket in mouth-blown, moulded glass". An adverb chicly has also appeared: "Pamela Gross ... turned up chicly dressed down". The use of the French très chic (very chic) by an English speaker – "Luckily it's très chic to be neurotic in New York" –
5985-478: The conditions of the artist, as current thinking tends to emphasize, using less rigid versions of Marxist art history. Although style was well-established as a central component of art historical analysis, seeing it as the over-riding factor in art history had fallen out of fashion by World War II, as other ways of looking at art were developing, as well as a reaction against the emphasis on style; for Svetlana Alpers , "the normal invocation of style in art history
6090-472: The cut and style of which had little cause to change over a number of centuries. Though there had been distribution of dressed dolls from France since the 16th century and Abraham Bosse had produced engravings of fashion in the 1620s, the pace of change picked up in the 1780s with increased publication of French engravings illustrating the latest Paris styles. By 1800, all Western Europeans were dressing alike (or thought they were); local variation became first
6195-446: The cut of a gentleman's coat and the length of his waistcoat, or the pattern to which a lady's dress was cut, changed more slowly. Men's fashions were primarily derived from military models, and changes in a European male silhouette were galvanized in theaters of European war where gentleman officers had opportunities to make notes of different styles such as the "Steinkirk" cravat or necktie. Both parties wore shirts under their clothing,
6300-616: The debate, which has also drawn on wider developments in critical theory . In 2010 Jas Elsner put it more strongly: "For nearly the whole of the 20th century, style art history has been the indisputable king of the discipline, but since the revolutions of the seventies and eighties the king has been dead", though his article explores ways in which "style art history" remains alive, and his comment would hardly be applicable to archaeology. The use of terms such as Counter- Maniera appears to be in decline, as impatience with such "style labels" grows among art historians. In 2000 Marcia B. Hall ,
6405-427: The development of style in Italian painting (mainly) from Giotto to his own Mannerist period. He stressed the development of a Florentine style based on disegno or line-based drawing, rather than Venetian colour. With other Renaissance theorists like Leon Battista Alberti he continued classical debates over the best balance in art between the realistic depiction of nature and idealization of it; this debate
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#17328697757376510-465: The differences in his actual (or composite) contrast of Nuremberg and Venetian fashions at the close of the 15th century (illustration, right). The "Spanish style" of the late 16th century began the move back to synchronicity among upper-class Europeans, and after a struggle in the mid-17th century, French styles decisively took over leadership, a process completed in the 18th century. Though different textile colors and patterns changed from year to year,
6615-413: The distance between an individual and his society". American sociologist Diana Crane also mentioned in her book that fashion is closely intertwined with personal and group identity, serving as a means of expressing cultural, social, and political affiliations. Changes in clothing often took place at times of economic or social change, as occurred in ancient Rome and the medieval Caliphate , followed by
6720-599: The distinction of what is fashion themselves. Whereas a trend often connotes a peculiar aesthetic expression, often lasting shorter than a season and being identifiable by visual extremes, fashion is a distinctive and industry-supported expression traditionally tied to the fashion season and collections . Style is an expression that lasts over many seasons and is often connected to cultural movements and social markers , symbols, class, and culture (such as Baroque and Rococo ). According to sociologist Pierre Bourdieu , fashion connotes "the latest difference." Even though
6825-611: The early 2020s , stetsons , white baseball jerseys with bold red or blue pinstripes , striped blue neckties , baggy white pants , Union Jack motifs, flared jeans , duster coats as worn in the Yellowstone TV series, preppy style college sweaters , retro blue and white striped football shirts , chelsea boots with cowboy boot styling, two-button blazers with red and blue boating stripes, V-neck sweater vests , royal blue baseball jackets with white sleeves, Howler Brothers gilets , shirts and suits worn open to expose
6930-421: The emergence of industrialism , the power of the guilds was undermined. Before the mid-19th century, most clothing was custom-made . It was handmade for individuals, either as home production or on order from dressmakers and tailors. By the beginning of the 20th century, with the rise of new technologies such as the sewing machine , the rise of global trade, the development of the factory system of production, and
7035-569: The expression of political and social views by the artist a good deal earlier than is normally detected in the West. Calligraphy, also regarded as a fine art in the Islamic world and East Asia , brings a new area within the ambit of personal style; the ideal of Western calligraphy tends to be to suppress individual style, while graphology , which relies upon it, regards itself as a science. The painter Edward Edwards said in his Anecdotes of Painters (1808): "Mr. Gainsborough 's manner of penciling
7140-405: The fashion industry consist of many separate but interdependent sectors. These sectors include textile design and production, fashion design and manufacturing, fashion retailing, marketing and merchandising , fashion shows , and media and marketing. Each sector is devoted to the goal of satisfying consumer demand for apparel under conditions that enable participants in the industry to operate at
7245-405: The fashion industry typically are reported for national economies and expressed in terms of the industry's many separate sectors, aggregate figures for the world production of textiles and clothing are difficult to obtain. However, by any measure, the clothing industry accounts for a significant share of world economic output. The fashion industry consists of four levels: The levels of focus in
7350-407: The idea of personal style is certainly not limited to the Western tradition. In Chinese art it is just as deeply held, but traditionally regarded as a factor in the appreciation of some types of art, above all calligraphy and literati painting , but not others, such as Chinese porcelain; a distinction also often seen in the so-called decorative arts in the West. Chinese painting also allowed for
7455-425: The individual style, sometimes called the signature style , of an artist: "the notion of personal style—that individuality can be uniquely expressed not only in the way an artist draws, but also in the stylistic quirks of an author's writing (for instance)— is perhaps an axiom of Western notions of identity". The identification of individual styles is especially important in the attribution of works to artists, which
7560-468: The invention of art historians and would not have been understood by the practitioners of those styles. Some originated as terms of derision, including Gothic , Baroque , and Rococo . Cubism on the other hand was a conscious identification made by a few artists; the word itself seems to have originated with critics rather than painters, but was rapidly accepted by the artists. Western art, like that of some other cultures, most notably Chinese art , has
7665-500: The latest ideer. If you want to be chick you just 'ang on to it, it seems". By contrast, in Anita Loos ' novel, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1925), the diarist Lorelei Lee recorded that "the French use the word 'sheik' for everything, while we only seem to use it for gentlemen when they seem to resemble Rudolf Valentino " (a pun derived from the latter's being the star of the 1921 silent film, The Sheik ). The Oxford Dictionary gives
7770-475: The latest trends, but may often reference fashions of a previous era, leading to the reappearance of fashions from a different time period. While what is fashionable can be defined by a relatively insular, esteemed and often rich aesthetic elite who make a look exclusive, such as fashion houses and haute couturiers , this 'look' is often designed by pulling references from subcultures and social groups who are not considered elite, and are thus excluded from making
7875-455: The most significant fashion companies and are renowned for their major influence on global fashion. Fashion weeks are held in these cities, where designers exhibit their new clothing collections to audiences. A study demonstrated that general proximity to New York's Garment District was important to participate in the American fashion ecosystem. Haute couture has now largely been subsidized by
7980-412: The music video 'Formation' by Beyoncé , according to Carlos, The annual or seasonal runway show is a reflection of fashion trends and a designer's inspirations. For designers like Vivienne Westwood , runway shows are a platform for her voice on politics and current events. For her AW15 menswear show, according to Water, "where models with severely bruised faces channeled eco-warriors on a mission to save
8085-475: The officials were also required to wear Western suits. In this way, the Japanese slowly adopted into Western fashion. Moreover, like India, different Japanese religions wear different pieces of clothing. In its most common use, the term fashion refers to the current expressions on sale through the fashion industry. The global fashion industry is a product of the modern age. In the Western world, tailoring has since medieval times been controlled by guilds , but with
8190-430: The planet." Another recent example is a staged feminist protest march for Chanel's SS15 show, rioting models chanting words of empowerment using signs like "Feminist but feminine" and "Ladies first." According to Water, "The show tapped into Chanel's long history of championing female independence: founder Coco Chanel was a trailblazer for liberating the female body in the post-WWI era, introducing silhouettes that countered
8295-556: The proliferation of retail outlets such as department stores, clothing became increasingly mass-produced in standard sizes and sold at fixed prices. Although the fashion industry developed first in Europe and America, as of 2017 , it is an international and highly globalized industry, with clothing often designed in one country, manufactured in another, and sold worldwide. For example, an American fashion company might source fabric in China and have
8400-532: The qualitative Ancient Greek concept of kairos , meaning "the right, critical, or opportune moment", and clothing to the quantitative concept of chronos , the personification of chronological or sequential time. While some exclusive brands may claim the label haute couture , in France, the term is technically limited to members of the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture in Paris. Haute couture
8505-562: The question of whether purely functional artefacts exist). The identification of individual styles of artists or artisans has also been proposed in some cases even for remote periods such as the Ice Age art of the European Upper Paleolithic . As in art history, formal analysis of the morphology (shape) of individual artefacts is the starting point. This is used to construct typologies for different types of artefacts, and by
8610-483: The relatively few medieval writings on aesthetics did not greatly develop a concept of style in art, or analysis of it, and though Renaissance and Baroque writers on art are greatly concerned with what we would call style, they did not develop a coherent theory of it, at least outside architecture: Artistic styles shift with cultural conditions; a self-evident truth to any modern art historian, but an extraordinary idea in this period [Early Renaissance and earlier]. Nor
8715-490: The restrictive corsets then in favour." Style (visual arts) Style can be divided into the general style of a period, country or cultural group, group of artists or art movement , and the individual style of the artist within that group style. Divisions within both types of styles are often made, such as between "early", "middle" or "late". In some artists, such as Picasso for example, these divisions may be marked and easy to see; in others, they are more subtle. Style
8820-490: The rich usually led fashion, the increasing affluence of early modern Europe led to the bourgeoisie and even peasants following trends at a distance, but still uncomfortably close for the elites – a factor that Fernand Braudel regards as one of the main motors of changing fashion. In the 16th century , national differences were at their most pronounced. Ten 16th century portraits of German or Italian gentlemen may show ten entirely different hats. Albrecht Dürer illustrated
8925-512: The sale of ready-to-wear collections and perfume using the same branding. Modern Westerners have a vast number of choices in the selection of their clothes. What a person chooses to wear can reflect their personality or interests. When people who have high cultural status start to wear new or different styles, they may inspire a new fashion trend. People who like or respect these people are influenced by their style and begin wearing similarly styled clothes. Fashions may vary considerably within
9030-493: The simplification of line, form, and relationships of space and color", and observed that "[s]tylized art reduces visual perception to constructs of pattern in line, surface elaboration and flattened space". Ancient, traditional, and modern art , as well as popular forms such as cartoons or animation very often use stylized representations, so for example The Simpsons use highly stylized depictions, as does traditional African art . The two Picasso paintings illustrated at
9135-503: The social and cultural context of an environment. According to Matika, "Elements of popular culture become fused when a person's trend is associated with a preference for a genre of music […] like music, news, or literature, fashion has been fused into everyday lives." Fashion is not only seen as purely aesthetic; fashion is also a medium for people to create an overall effect and express their opinions and overall art. This mirrors what performers frequently accomplish through music videos. In
9240-413: The start of Western fashion in clothing to the middle of the 14th century , though they tend to rely heavily on contemporary imagery, as illuminated manuscripts were not common before the 14th century. The most dramatic early change in fashion was a sudden drastic shortening and tightening of the male over-garment from calf-length to barely covering the buttocks, sometimes accompanied with stuffing in
9345-477: The succession of schools of archaeological theory in the last century, from culture-historical archaeology to processual archaeology and finally the rise of post-processual archaeology in recent decades has not significantly reduced the importance of the study of style in archaeology, as a basis for classifying objects before further interpretation. Stylization and stylized (or stylisation and stylised in (non-Oxford) British English , respectively) have
9450-482: The technique of seriation a relative dating based on style for a site or group of sites is achieved where scientific absolute dating techniques cannot be used, in particular where only stone, ceramic or metal artefacts or remains are available, which is often the case. Sherds of pottery are often very numerous in sites from many cultures and periods, and even small pieces may be confidently dated by their style. In contrast to recent trends in academic art history,
9555-470: The terms fashion , clothing and costume are often used together, fashion differs from both. Clothing describes the material and the technical garment, devoid of any social meaning or connections; costume has come to mean fancy dress or masquerade wear. Fashion, by contrast, describes the social and temporal system that influences and "activates" dress as a social signifier in a certain time and context. Philosopher Giorgio Agamben connects fashion to
9660-479: The top of this page show a movement to a more stylized representation of the human figure within the painter's style, and the Uffington White Horse is an example of a highly stylized prehistoric depiction of a horse. Motifs in the decorative arts such as the palmette or arabesque are often highly stylized versions of the parts of plants. Even in art that is in general attempting mimesis or "realism",
9765-484: The wearer's bare shoulder, thigh, or midriff , such as low-cut waists on the pants or tops with strappy necklines intended to be worn braless . Desirable colours included neon green, watermelon green, coral pink , orange, salmon pink , magenta , gold , electric blue , aquamarine , cyan , turquoise , and royal blue . In 2023, the predominant colours in Britain, France and America were red, white and blue. As in
9870-416: The wearer's body shape, or whether the garment has been washed, folded, mended, or is new. Fashion is defined in a number of different ways, and its application can be sometimes unclear. Though the term fashion connotes difference, as in "the new fashions of the season", it can also connote sameness, for example in reference to "the fashions of the 1960s", implying a general uniformity. Fashion can signify
9975-426: The word chicane . Although the French pronunciation (/ˈʃiːk/ or "sheek") is now virtually standard and was that given by Fowler , chic was often rendered in the anglicised form of "chick". In a fictional vignette for Punch ( c . 1932) Mrs F. A. Kilpatrick attributed to a young woman who 70 years later would have been called a " chavette " the following assertion: "It 'asn't go no buttons neither ... That's
10080-416: The years "chic" has been applied to, among other things, social events, situations, individuals, and modes or styles of dress. It was one of a number of "slang words" that H. W. Fowler linked to particular professions – specifically, to "society journalism" – with the advice that, if used in such a context, "familiarity will disguise and sometimes it will bring out its slanginess." Fashion Fashion
10185-559: Was "not so used in Fr[ench]." Gustave Flaubert notes in Madame Bovary (published in 1856) that "chicard" (one who is chic) is then Parisian very current slang for "classy" noting, perhaps derisively, perhaps not, that it was bourgeois. There is a similar word in German , schick , with a meaning similar to chic , which may be the origin of the word in French ; another theory links chic to
10290-415: Was a major concern of 19th century scholars in the new and initially mostly German-speaking field of art history , with important writers on the broad theory of style including Carl Friedrich von Rumohr , Gottfried Semper , and Alois Riegl in his Stilfragen of 1893, with Heinrich Wölfflin and Paul Frankl continuing the debate in the 20th century. Paul Jacobsthal and Josef Strzygowski are among
10395-453: Was before Modernism essentially imitative, relying on taught technical methods, whether learnt as an apprentice in a workshop or later as a student in an academy, there was always room for personal variation. The idea of technical "secrets" closely guarded by the master who developed them, is a long-standing topos in art history from Vasari's probably mythical account of Jan van Eyck to the secretive habits of Georges Seurat . However
10500-408: Was brought by rapid commercialization. Clothing which experienced fast changing fashion in ancient China was recorded in ancient Chinese texts, where it was sometimes referred as shiyang , "contemporary-styles", and was associated with the concept of fuyao , "outrageous dress", which typically holds a negative connotation. Similar changes in clothing can be seen in Japanese clothing between
10605-426: Was expected for people to be dressed accordingly to their gender, social status and occupation; the Chinese clothing system had cleared evolution and varied in appearance in each period of history. However, ancient Chinese fashion, like in other cultures, was an indicator of the socioeconomic conditions of its population; for Confucian scholars, however, changing fashion was often associated with social disorder which
10710-680: Was so peculiar to himself, that his work needed no signature". Examples of strongly individual styles include: the Cubist art of Pablo Picasso , the Pop Art style of Andy Warhol , Impressionist style of Vincent Van Gogh , Drip Painting by Jackson Pollock "Manner" is a related term, often used for what is in effect a sub-division of a style, perhaps focused on particular points of style or technique. While many elements of period style can be reduced to characteristic forms or shapes, that can adequately be represented in simple line-drawn diagrams, "manner"
10815-586: Was the name established by the government for the fashion houses that met the standards of the industry. These fashion houses continue to adhere to standards such as keeping at least twenty employees engaged in making the clothes, showing two collections per year at fashion shows, and presenting a certain number of patterns to costumers. Since then, the idea of the fashion designer as a celebrity in their own right has become increasingly dominant. Although fashion can be feminine or masculine, additional trends are androgynous . The idea of unisex dressing originated in
10920-514: Was to continue until the 19th century and the advent of Modernism . The theorist of Neoclassicism , Johann Joachim Winckelmann , analysed the stylistic changes in Greek classical art in 1764, comparing them closely to the changes in Renaissance art , and " Georg Hegel codified the notion that each historical period will have a typical style", casting a very long shadow over the study of style. Hegel
11025-759: Was used as a form of currency in trade with the Portuguese and Dutch as early as the 16th century, and locally produced cloth and cheaper European imports were assembled into new styles to accommodate the growing elite class of West Africans and resident gold and slave traders. There was an exceptionally strong tradition of weaving in the Oyo Empire , and the areas inhabited by the Igbo people . The beginning in Europe of continual and accelerating change in clothing styles can be fairly reliably dated to late medieval times . Historians, including James Laver and Fernand Braudel , date
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