In der Regel werden internationale Trends in Deutschland
erst dann wahrgenommen, wenn Köpfe rollen oder die Bi-
lanzen stimmen. GUCCI kann
mit beidem dienen. Drei Jah-
re nachdem Alessandro Michele mit einer
bahnbrechenden
Show sein Amt als künstlerischer Leiter des italienischen
Modehauses antrat, ist es auch bei den betonierten Stilre-
dakteuren der
deutschen Qualitätspresse angekommen: Die
Schluppenblusen sind gekommen, um zu
bleiben. Und um
die als Show Notes getarnten Flugblätter einer sich gerade
warmlaufenden permanenten Revolution kommt man auch
nicht mehr herum. CYBORG, das jüngste Manifest, das zur
Präsentation der FALL WINTER
2018-2019 COLLECTION ge-
reicht wurde, hat ein*e Geladene*r
abfotografiert und auf
Twitter gepostet:
The challenge of the
disciplinary power is to impose a pre-
cise identity on the subject. This
operation is carried out
placing the subject inside binary fixed categories, as the nor-
mal / abnormal one, with the specific intent of classifying,
controlling
and regulating the subject. The regulative strate-
gies prove so alluring that
the subject voluntarily chooses to
stick to that particular categorization,
claiming its positioning
inside a given social structure. In this frame of
reference, the
regulation of the living body uses the concept of identity as a
device of bio-political control (M. Foucault).
Identity, though, is neither a
natural matter nor a preset
category, which can be imposed with violence. It’s
not an
immutable and fixed fact, rather a social and cultural con-
struction and,
as such, it’s a matter of choice, joining, in-
vention. Identity, thus, is a
never ending process, keen on
new determinations each time. The consciousness
of how
everything is socially built, even who we are, opens a field
of fresh
possibilities to performatively explore. A field of
liberty and responsibility
in which anybody can become who
he / she really wants to be, getting social
expectations and
personal desires back in the game.
The subjectivities embodying Gucci’s pluriverse move in
this
field, which is ethic and political at the same time.
They represent the
invitation to diverge, not conforming
to univocal and other-directed identity
models, and the en-
couragement to spread other ways of thinking about our-
selves
that are able to violate preset categorizations. In
this regard, what can seem
atypical, anomalous, flawed to
a normalizing eye, acquires a new legitimacy. A
new breath.
The courageous affirmation of the self and its singularity.
The collection goes further
beyond, taking the shape of a
genuine Cyborg Manifesto (D. J. Haraway), in
which the hy-
brid is metaphorically praised as a figure that can overcome
the
dualism and the dichotomy of identity. The Cyborg, in
fact, is a paradoxical
creature keeping together nature and
culture, masculine and feminine, normal
and alien, psyche
and matter. Conflicting with any categorie grid, the Cyborg
is the expression that blends different evolving identities.
Hybrid and
shifting identities, built on multiple belongings,
that transgress the
normative discipline.
Gucci Cyborg is post-human: it
has eyes on its hands, faun
horns, dragon’s puppies and doubling heads. It’s a
biologi-
cally indefinite and culturally aware creature. The last and
extreme
sign of a mongrel identity under constant transfor-
mation. The symbol of an
emancipatory possibility through
which we can decide to become what we are.
