About 100 photos define the perimeters of Oliver Sieber’s “Imaginary Club, portraits taken in a makeshift studio of concerts, festivals and in clubs, and juxtaposed with black and white shots of deserted rehearsal spaces, street shots and club entrances. 

Oliver Sieber’s “Imaginary Club” is exhibited at the Villa Noailles in Hyères as part of the 29th International Fashion & Photography Festival, a variation on his most recent book of same title.  While setting up this exhibition, Oliver and his collaborator Katja Stuke spoke to The Stimuleye about the need of upheaval, total erosion of style and dress codes in youth culture and the need to find new forms of expressing positions of identity.

Oliver Sieber, "Imaginary Club": Exhibition at Villa Noailles, Hyeres

THE IMAGINARY CLUB

The Stimuleye: Who are these people in your “Imaginary Club”?

Oliver: What really interests me is reaction and forms of counter culture.
After WWII, the teenagers in America and England started to discover new forms of music and fashion, new forms of liberation. Many people I met are still in this sort of idea.  Punk is a very good example, because it did have real societal meaning.

That is what is important to teenager culture: upheaval, the struggle to identification, to root themselves. To not only take position against the elder generation, but in general. And that has often to do with music. I am interested in music, and communication of style codes.

The people in my “Imaginary Club” are not always part of a subculture in the classic sense. I have also portrayed artist friends, that, similar to teenagers, are forced to redefine themselves again and again. Here for example is a photo of Rebecca. From a wealthy family, she received always best grades, suddenly something switched in her head. Rebelling against her intellectual parents, she was climbing down the eaves gutters and was not to tame anymore.

Oliver Sieber, "Imaginary Club": Exhibition at Villa Noailles, Hyeres. Right Side: Rebecca

When I look at my work, I understand it as an entry for the viewer, or a window upon which I reflect myself. Often it is not really about what is on the wall or who is depicted, but about the dialogue between the image and the onlooker. That changes from person to person.

The Stimuleye: Looking at the Portraits there are many Punks, Skinheads, Rockabillies.- is there also something a bit like nostalgia?

Oliver: We have a very globalized music culture today. Subcultures developing real novelties is something rather sparse and rare.  Are there really subcultures that result from youth movements? I think it is not like that anymore. It’s more that youngsters try to identify with their role models of choice.

A good example is David Bowie that in the 70’s offered an image of “multi sexual liberation” for many people, also in combination with music and the song texts that bore a poetry and language that people picked up on.  Just because we have 2014 now, his music did not disappear. You can still buy the records and the language still speaks to people who want to identify with it. And as fans do, they associate themselves with this.  I think people living this don’t reflect on what they do, as we look at it. They just do it.

Katja:
There are always new aspects adding up and things get mixed up. So you have a development that can’t be called the “nostalgic”. It may be rooted in a source, and like in this case ideally there is a progression where new aspects ad up.

Oliver Sieber, excepts from the book "Imaginary Club"

FASHION CODES AND THE INTERNET : THE NEW  “FUCK YOU”

Katja:
Today you often cannot rely on the looks giving an indication on who people are: In Germany you find nazis that look like left anarchist “Antifa” fighters.
That possibly has to do with the internet, where you can communicate your stance or orientation in different ways then through fashion and dress codes.
You also have to react on other people adapting what you personally take serious as a subculture, how they mix your codes, abuse or pervert them.

This makes it sometimes also difficult to determine whom are you following in a protest, where codes are so mixed up, that no one is able to keep up track.
For example in Ukraine its absolutely ambiguous who is protesting with whom recently. Unlike in the past, today it’s hard to determine who is on which side, from demonstrator to counter protester. Now you have young Nazi Hipsters in all black with tight jeans shouldering a jute bag, which really requires more than a second look to recognize what is going on.

In this position you’re forced to find other forms to show your conviction that are different and function without the need of fashion as we had it in the past.
I am sure there are subcultures, but they function really differently, without the involvement of fashion, as the channels are much more multi layered. It’s not about provoking through your look anymore, because nowadays people are not easy to shock. So you have to find other ways and places to put your orientation forwards.

Oliver Sieber, excepts from the book "Imaginary Club"

Oliver: In Japan a lot of messages get transported through flyers and stickers. This was similar in Los Angeles up until recently, but it changed and is now functioning mainly through hotmail panels. Everyone has a smartphone, no matter to which group you belong. The Cosplay culture for example functions only through the forums in the web. That’s all chat, appointments for conventions and Skype.

Katja:
But the internet is not at all as public as you may expect.
Often it’s very difficult to access a certain online group or forums. There are strict admins that want to know who you are and what you do, and remind you that with access you commit to a regular contribution etc- so you can’t just get in and check out. It’s much easier to go into a bar or a club, even if you have to pass and convince the bouncer.

Oliver:
For example I photographed a young punk who realized how his style had been adapted and declared a trend. He totally changed his appearance to not be associated with this widely publicized new trend. That doesn’t mean though that his anti-ascist conviction or adoration for punk changed at all.

As label and the designers pick up on elements of subculture their message is watered down extremely fast, so you have to have to change your codes again. As Jason (Evans) recently said at the Tate: “The new normal is the new ‘Fuck You,'”, because you can’t be categorized like this anymore.

Oliver Sieber, "Imaginary Club": Exhibition at Villa Noailles, Hyeres

PROTEST

Oliver:
That there is a new protest culture again is really great. These positions are getting from the internet to the street again, where you suddenly  have to make an effort, as the codes we’re used to don’t work anymore when you can’t diversify between “good” and “evil”, nor recognize “your” or “my” people.

Katja:
At the same time there is also these movements of parallel culture to create an existence and surrounding of some sorts of withdraw, even resigning.
This may be an approach resulting from being overwhelmed by societal developments. Specially in Japan we’ve met people that engage in small initiatives, artistic ones or others that take care of the homeless. There is this movement of “do it yourself” culture where people search for new forms of living for themselves apart from mainstream, norms and social graces, which are less visible.

Oliver:
When visiting Osaka soon for another exhibit, we plan to investigate deeper into this, meet with these “alternative” people that found a totally different life and structure within of Japanese society.
What I found puzzling was that we met many homeless who spoke great English or Spanish, and had lived and worked abroad, but this had lead that they were not fully integrable any more into society, because the’ve been abroad too long and back in Japan landed on the street.

Katja:
I think that also has to do that people with knowledge of languages have access to much more information over the internet for example, and thus are more open to ideas to try a different draft for their life than their parents, because that didn’t work that well either.
Specially as you can’t rely on social securities anymore- it’s not like our parent generation that studied, took a job and continued with a great retirement plan.

Oliver Sieber, excepts from the book "Imaginary Club"

The Stimuleye: How do you work together?

Katja:
There are varying methods, but at times there are actual connections or a common greater theme and possibilities to juxtapose our work in an exhibition or we publish a book together for example at BöhmKobayashi.

The City of Duesseldorf has provided us with a space we curated for three years where we developed “ANT!FOTO” which was to show exhibitions on positions of photography we feel were missing. As a result we also started a publication the “ANT!FOTO Manifest”  which was a common project of us.

Oliver:
The “ANT!FOTO Manifest”  was a project where we asked 70 photographer and curators to word their statement after a 10 point thesis we created. Initially this was planned only as a magazine, but finally will be shown in the Museum Folkwang as well as going to the
Fotomuseum Winterthur .

The Stimuleye: What is the last thing that stimulated you?

Oliver:
After we talked so much on imagery, I would like to mention something that stimulated me:
when we talked to Frenkie (Bosnian Rapper) while visiting him in Tuzla, i asked him what is “heimat” (homeland) to him.
He said after being a refugee returning from Nuernberg to Tuzla, he realized what he missed: it was the scent of the firing wood that you can smell everywhere in the city. For my senses, apart from sound or music, the smell is very important.

Oliver Sieber, excepts from the book "Imaginary Club"

Imaginary Club 2005-2012 
432 pages, Offset-Print,
a BöhmKobayashi/GwinZegal Joint

Imaginary Club is running at the Villa Noailles in Hyeres until may 25, 2014
and after that at the Galerie Stieglitz 19 in Antwerpen. Opening May 25, 2014,
further dates are at PhotoBookMuseum from August 19, 2014 and after that the Exhibition will be travelling

‘Doctor’ Mulatu Astatke as he likes to remind us, is not only a jazzman, but a doctor in musicology, who is eager to add to the lists of achievements of his home country, Ethiopia: coffee, inspiration to the Rastafarian faith, the invention of the musical scale, and it would seem, music conducting.

The bushes. Debussy. In the the mouth of Mulatu Astatke, it’s hard to hear the difference between the two.

Doctor Mulatu Astatke, "Father of Ethio-Jazz" as his business Card states. Calvi 2013. 
Photography by René Habermacher.

Mulatu with drum sticks shortly before going on stage. The composer’s own signature instrument is the vibraphone,
a set of graduated aluminum percussion bars that resemble a marimba or a xylophone. Photography by René Habermacher

Mulatu Astatke received late recognition: Originally supposed to become an aeronautical engineer he was
the first African student in the late 1950s at Berklee College of Music — “the only place in that time,” 
he said, to study jazz. Photography by René Habermacher.

Mulatu in action at Calvi On The Rocks, Corsica 2013. Photography by René Habermacher

Mulatu at Calvi On The Rocks, Corsica 2013. Photography by René Habermacher

Mulatu at Calvi On The Rocks, Corsica 2013. In the late 1960s he had returned to Ethiopia with
the first Hammond Organ and Vibraphones. Photography by René Habermacher

For women’s fashion week in September, Closed will open its first flagship store in Paris.

Overall "Illusion" from the FW 13/14 collection by Kostas Murkudis for Closed Jeans. Photography by René Habermacher

René Habermacher: When I heard you’d be working for Closed jeans, I thought it made great sense with your approach – sustainability, resistance, utilitarianism and uniformity are expressions that come to mind when thinking of your work, and all of these seem to be relevant in the context of jeanswear.

KM: I grew up in the DDR (German Democratic Republic), in East Germany, so these are surely aspects of my work that I value and are part of my professional ethos that I will follow up into the future. It’s my contribution, to make it accessible to more people than for example with my own brand.

I always had “two hearts beating in my chest”: one more poetic, free of necessities, and the other that is more about durability and functionality everyday. I always loved the approach of the Bauhaus, it is very important to me. But I really do love both aspects. Now with my new mission at Closed, I can really apply everything you described, I have all tools and a fantastic team I love working with.
For me this is the perfect balance between the two brands.

Whereas with my own brand, my mini-label that I call my laboratory, I don’t have to think about whether the piece is really durable, has the right pocket or whatever. I just can do projects important to me, which do not necessarily have anything to do with fashion. For example recently I have worked with a royal glass manufactory in Munich, Lobmeyr, that usually do stuff like church windows etc. I think there are so many possibilities and I am very curious for new challenges.

Shirt and Jeans FW 13/14 Kostas Murkudis for Closed. Photography by René Habermacher

RH: You’re working for quite some time in fashion now. When you started, fashion was something different: in the 90’s, fashion still had a socio-cultural context, was a compass and expressive part of movements. Today it’s different, its not really that a social movement expresses anything through dressing codes.

KM: That’s true and has obviously social, socio-political, and sociological causes. There is very little happening that could tempt for re-orientation. I do really hope that finally something will be happening. Or has it started already? When you look what is going on in Brasil, or Turkey, in countries where I would not have expected that this kind of movement would be surfacing.

The situations in Greece, Portugal or Spain, France and possibly soon England, don’t look so great either, but something is happening and I am hoping very much that this will spread across cultures and regions, and maybe create the necessity to develop new codes. Obviously they have to develop themselves, we as designers can’t help it.

RH: For quite a while fashion hasn’t had a cultural value of progress, it has become more a simple “garment industry.”

KM: That’s right. Fashion is not allowed to be like this anymore. It’s the very capitalist approach to define success only through growth, to which the big houses are forced to: generating work, circulate money, this and that – it’s not about content at all. In fact it is even arbitrary who designs. It is the brand with its margin that is in focus.
If that’s what’s thriving in society, fashion can only be its image.

On the other hand, design has become another aspect – let’s take an example like the iPod, or the iPhone and what has been generated here: a simplicity, practicability and a beauty of objects that have not been produced like this in a while.

It’s not about developing funky variants and decorations, but to work continuously on refinement and improvement with every generation, which I believe impacts our everyday culture. Even kids are not seduced to just buy something new because there are some new crazy buttons added. And you don’t have the desire to buy a jeans with 25 embroideries and absurd stitchings on the butt that are completely pointless. This pointlessness, this battle of material is not working anymore.

Jeans dress FW 13/14 Kostas Murkudis for Closed. Photography by René Habermacher

„First there is nothing, then a deep void and finally a blue depth.“

Yves Klein.(Leitmotif for the colour codes to the SKYWALK CAPSULE COLLECTION No.1)

For example my brother Andreas, who owns a concept store in Berlin, he affords himself the luxury to buy only what he thinks is really good, regardless of the label. He buys what is up-to-date in his eyes. He was totally shocked about the pricing for which it’s possible to get good design that is on top politically correct produced in Italy: good quality fondly fabricated from great fabric. Not that this is world changing…

RH: But democratic?

KM: Democratic in a positive way. I didn’t really want to use that word. When my brother saw the Skywalk Capsule Collection in Berlin, he went to order straight away several looks from the FW collection, saying: “wow, this is really cheap- and so cool, but really cheap”.
Of course we have the same approach, maybe also because we grew up in the DDR: for us longevity or functionality and beauty don’t have to cancel each other out.

RH: What is your relationship to glamour?

KM: I try to stay remote, but sometimes have to make compromises. My relationship is rather an aversion. I come from a very simple background and it really does not touch me to hear “who was where with who wearing what”, that doesn’t interest me.

Right Side two pieces from the SKYWALK CAPSULE COLLECTION: Murkudis took inspiration from a vintage aviator suit,
using the cuts and details to create a minimal wardrobe: a shirt, a blouson and pants for men and women.
Boots: vintage DDR army. Photography by René Habermacher

„Earth is a delicate shade of blue“

Yuri Gagarin (Leitmotif for the colour codes to the SKYWALK CAPSULE COLLECTION No.1)

RH: Tell me a little more about the Skywalk Capsule Collection…

KM: The idea was based on the desire to bring the brand back to an international level, and the one of the brands defining aspects: the idea of unisex, that I thought very interesting and gave me also the possibility to explore menswear more, find a different angle and define their image more sharply.

Because the project was a very small range, I had to stay quite precise as well in material as colour and design, but it was the first time that I had the chance to show pieces that one actually can afford. If you look at the product, it appears at first sight quite minimal, even though its technology is actually very complex, which is something I wanted to put forward as well.

But because of all this, it was quite obvious to me to give the collection somewhat of a poetic moment.

RH: Yet here is also a practical thought behind it?

KM: Of course. It was to show the brand’s core, and a product that should function in the everyday life over long time.

Apart from that, the beauty of a product becomes apparent in its use, becomes part of our lives and our bodies. That’s what makes a jeans. It only becomes your jeans, and a great one, when it deforms on your own body, through use, through touch, through creases, through whatever. It becomes part of your being. That makes it truly beautiful when it is beautiful.

Felt Perfecto Jacket and Jeans, both FW 13/14 Costas Murkudis for Closed. Photography by René Habermacher

RH: With a clientele living in the most various meteorological conditions, does it really make sense today to produce season-oriented collections?

KM: This is a totally legitimate question. Also as we know that the big producers often deliver new products up to twelve times a year.
So for smaller brands it is indeed worth considering to orient themselves differently because they have no chance to stand up against this moloch of an industry.

In a way we are overtaking ourselves with everything: when the sales start the season hasn’t even really begun, there is a resort collection, a pre-collection and a in-between collection- that is all a bit absurd. I see that with my brother, who says “I don’t need a pre-collection that is delivered in November when its perhaps snowing here and -30 celsius”. That makes no sense.

On the other side I am bound to the cycles of the classic way of producing 4 collections a year.
I think the problematics are there for everyone, but no one has yet found an ultimate solution, or takes the risk to say ‘I am going to position myself entirely new in this context.’

RH: In your case do you do a presentation, or are you considering eventually a show?

KM: Right now this is not a real topic for us. Maybe next year or after that, it really depends on how we develop and what our expansion will bring.

RH: The one thing I find puzzling is with all the coverage on the shows, once the products are in the shops, you are already bored of them.

KM: I totally agree with you that three weeks after the shows you vaguely remember and when the products are delivered to the shops you practically forgot about it all. This wish and desire to own the pieces immediately is fading in that period.
But that’s what you have Zara for: they deliver within three weeks after the show a dampened version for those who can’t wait at all and never really got it anyway: those will buy the cheap copy (laughs).
By then the others just saw the newest collections and are wondering that they have ever liked the current one…. I look at this smiling.

Left: Jeans dress, Right: Split neck pullover and Jeans, all FW 13/14 Kostas Murkudis for Closed.
Boots: vintage DDR army. Photography by René Habermacher

RH: You do have a special relationship with Japan, is that right?

KM: Yes, when I was a small kid, I started to do judo. I had a fantastic teacher that I absolutely worshipped as a living hero.
I was excited to wear these suits, the belts. The scent of the mats, the bows, this outlandish language had fascinated me. To me it was of course an escape from my Greek moulded DDR prosaicness and the pressure to perform. I did virtually absorb all these words, ceremonies and preserve within for years.

When I started to be interested in the arts I read a biography of Yves Klein, and realised he was a judo master like me, and eventually lived in Japan. I think his work was to some degree influenced by Japanese moments, in their simplicity and splendidness. This has really accompanied me ever since. The Bauhaus would have been unthinkable without the Japanese influence. In many aspects this influence has developed with me, the desire towards the exotic but as well the austere, the sophistication and the celebrated. The handling of colours, surface but also the poetic moments and the spiritual aspects behind.

I celebrated plenty successes in Japan and grew with these, so I owe a lot to the Japanese. We found each other. I was always fascinated and excited about it, to the point that Gordon, one of the owners of Closed, and I started to take Japanese lessons.

This hunger is not satisfied yet- and will always find itself in my work again.

RH: What is the last thing that stimulated you?

KM: I was very inspired by the exhibition of Martin Kippenberger: the incredible freedom of a man in dealing with the most different tools. I have great respect for his state of mind that moved me to tears of joy. I haven’t laughed that much for a while. All my senses had been spurred through this.

CLOSED

This interview and photographs are a Stimuleye exclusive
interview and photography RENÉ HABERMACHER
fashion editor SUZANNE VON AICHINGER
hair JONATHAN GEIMON @ AIRPORT AGENCY using Bumble and Bumble
make up MIN KIM @ AIRPORT AGENCY
model KATE B @ NEXT MODELS
thank you VERSAE VANNI @ NEXT PARIS
and LIBRAIRIE Ofr PARIS for your support

And yet everyone is flocking there since the Museum of Civilisations
of Europe & of the Mediterranean, dubbed MuCEM, opened its doors just weeks ago, the first national museum to open in the Phocean city, a project 11 years in the making. 

Having shot & directed the introductory ad campaign for this new institution, The Stimuleye introduces you to the man who designed it, a man as famous for the fights he picks as the building he designs.
Exclusive photos by René Habermacher.

Portrait of architect Rudy Ricciotti by René Habermacher.

One side is the Fort Saint-Jean, linked to the city by a pedestrian steel bridge. A fort not unlike the Bastille – a bastion to defend Marseille against itself – the Fort Saint-Jean had been closed to the public for centuries.

On the other, also connected by a massive steel bridge, is Ricciotti’s creation, facing the Mediterranean Sea.
Refusing “architectural bling,” Ricciotti chose to have the new building dematerialize itself to complement the Fort Saint-Jean.

No reflections – leave it to the sea.

The concrete filigree lace of the MuCEM, a second skin like a screen that allows views, light and air
to pervade the space. Photography by René Habermacher.

TV spot for the MuCEM's launch, directed by Antoine Asseraf with SayWho and Agence White.

The MuCEM's a porous monolithic body planted on pier J4 in the Mediterranean sea, connected to the Fort Saint-Jean
with a 115m long slender pathway made of massive cast iron. Photography by René Habermacher.

Antoine Asseraf: Can you elaborate on your theory of world being split between two sides, matte and shiny ?

Rudy Ricciotti: Shiny is conceptual distance, reason, power and self-assurance.
Matte is frontal narration, intuition, defeat and regret.
Pick your side… I did.

AA: Mediterranean is a concept going beyond “local” but stopping short of  “global” — how do you situate yourself, and the building, within that notion ?

RR: The South is a travel certificate, not a birth certificate.
The inhabitants of Munich are more mediterranean than those of Grenoble.
The Valais region in the south of Switzerland more latin than the Vaucluse in the south of France, etc.
The MuCEM is mediterranean through anxiety and existential difficulty.

AA: What is your relationship to monumental architecture ?

RR: You are talking to me, you fucked my wife ?

Top left: "Notre-Dame de la Garde" looming over Marseille and the the seven-level, 40 000 square meter
structure of the MuCEM. Photography by René Habermacher.

As massive the volume of the MuCEM may seem at first, it is the use of negative space that gives the building
the air of the metaphysical. Photography by René Habermacher

AA: What is the last thing which stimulated you ?

RR: A fish soup made by my partner…
Read my last pamphlet to smile:
« L’Architecture est un sport de combat » [Architecture is a combat sport], edited by Textuel.

MuCEM

With SayWho & Agence White

A THE STIMULEYE PRODUCTION
directed by Antoine Asseraf
filmed & edited by Thibault Della Gaspera
interviews Filep Motwary
coordination Clementine Colson
sound design Ça Va Chéri

Pierre Debusschere, Portrait by Filep Motwary.

Is this your first solo show?
I did small solo shows before but i like to think of this one as my first one because it is the first time the work has been thought of for an exhibition medium.

How does it feel exhibiting alongside someone like Guy Bourdin?
It is already an honour to be present at the Villa but even more to be next to Bourdin.

Your subjects-models are worked in a way to look like paintings, what is your aim exactly ?
The painting, the Flemish painters are a big influence for me, there is no specific aim linked to the painting besides the connection to my inspirations.
The technique that looks like paint that you are referring to is there more in the idea layers, different layers that gives the image different steps of reading.

Photo by Pierre Debusschere.

Photo by Pierre Debusschere.

Your show’s theme is beauty versus ugliness. What are your true influences? Is it connected to the work of Umberto Eco ?
Beauty versus ugliness is one of the themes worked in this show, the idea of what is beautiful or ugly today. Yes it is linked to Eco’s work, reading his book
on ugliness helped me a lot in this show.

Your work is tied to the digital medium. Can you imagine yourself working in a previous era ?
For sure I can see myself working in a previous era, it is not about digital, it is more about the medium that fits the time, the idea of NOW.

Photo by Pierre Debusschere.

You have created yourself a whole structure with 254 Forest, which allows you to do an original photo series, a book, an installation and a film… How important is organization to be an artist today ?

Yes I would not have been able without my team to create the photo-series, the book, the installation, the film, the soundtrack and the website !

It is always about Team work for me and I’m really grateful to have them besides me. Organisation is a big part of the work, even more for project like this when we created all this body of work in 2 months. Today you need to be able to react really fast because of the technology era we live in, so that’s why a team is important too !

You need to be present on every aspect of production at the same time ! But then we can not forget sometimes that we need to disconnect ourselves

PIERRE DEBUSSCHERE

Portrait by Filep Motwary.

Portrait by Filep Motwary.

Portrait by Filep Motwary.

Portrait by Filep Motwary.

Portrait by Filep Motwary.

Portrait by Filep Motwary.

Portrait by Filep Motwary.

portrait by Filep Motwary.

Portrait by Filep Motwary.

Photo by Scott Trindle.

AntoineAsseraf: Along with Industrie Magazine and the rise of the fashion blogger as a class, your blog has drawn attention to a lot of work, which was heretofore considered a bit peripheral to a designer’s raw talent. What do you make of a place like Hyères that still somehow naively stresses the belief that talent will find its own way? If you were to create a Business of Fashion competition/festival, how different would it be?

Imran: At BoF, we firmly believe in the power that lies at the intersection of creativity and business. Both are essential to a successful fashion enterprise, and one can’t work without the other. It’s a true symbiotic relationship. If we were to do a BoF festival therefore, it would be a combination of creative fashion presentation and business plan pitches, and the judges would come from both sides of the industry.

FilepMotwary: It seems to me that many of the young designers who dream of a future in fashion are unaware about “the business” of fashion in general. Should they worry of how things have evolved, and turned the industry into this huge marathon of task, values that need to be constantly re-valued, trends that suffers from the lack of longevity etc…?

Imran: I tell my students that once they start their own business, they will spend 90% of their time managing the business, and only 10% of the time designing. This balance is not something that has necessarily changed in recent years, but it’s true that there is more and more for a young designer to do in the global, digital fashion world in which we live today.

Sean Santiago: The internet and its popular content-sharing platforms, i.e. Tumblr and Pinterest, are destabilizing traditional revenue streams faster than new ones are being created. How will original creative output find funding in the future and do you see crowdsourcing methods such as, for instance, a Kickstarter campaign, possibly becoming necessary to the creation of original artistic output? Or will a big brand always foot the bill when it comes to fashion-related content?

Imran: Brands and designers could certainly fund portions of their businesses — say specific collections or products — via crowdsourcing platforms. But ultimately, I suspect that they will need to turn to traditional forms of fundraising (selling equity or taking loans) in order to fund the business over the long term. A young fashion business is highly cash flow intensive, and therefore will likely require stable and planned funding in order to fuel growth and expansion.

Malibongwe Tyilo: BOF is recognized as one of the boldest voices in fashion writing, often publishing pieces that might not be appreciated by some PR people. Considering how important PR has become to design companies, how does that affect how the design businesses deal with you?

Imran: We are bold, but I believe we are also fair and balanced. Part of the role we see for ourselves at BoF is to surface and shed light on important industry issues that merit wider discussion and debate.

If we can do so in a way that is balanced and fact-based, then most PR professionals seem to respect us for that.

Certainly, there are some who would prefer to control all the communication about their clients, but this is misguided and unrealistic.

28th International
Fashion & Photography Festival
Hyères 2013
April 26>29

Portrait Filep Motwary.

How does it feel for you being selected for this year’s edition of Hyeres ?
It’s an honor to be selected for one of the top fashion competition in the world. It’s really nice to be in the South of France, meeting new people and working in a nice environment.

How would you describe Hyeres in three words ?
Beautiful, cozy, atmospheric.

What has been your favorite part of the process so far ?
Working in the garden at the Villa Noailles with sunny weather and great surroundings.

In three words, what is your collection about ?
Marionettes, handwork and youthfulness.

In what ways you think participating in a Festival like Hyeres will help you in the future ?
I think it’s a great platform to present yourself internationally. Getting in contact with different company’s, people in the industry and press is a great starting point to start your own label or to work for a fashion brand.

28th International
Fashion & Photography Festival
Hyères 2013
April 26>29