And yet it’s never enough.

by Marko.

As an example:

Beyeren

Here are certain paraphrases or memories of a book I’ve read a while ago. Appreciate the immediacy of my twisted memory and imagination, please. You can hold it against me, if you so desire.

May a Vuitton nurse help us all. Or a purse.

Desire is a very peculiar thing, I hear you say. Well, you’re right. It is very odd, very strange. Of course, it has nothing to do with the simplicity of wishing or wishes. Desire is a mechanism that twists and distorts. The presence of desire is nothing but the distortion or modification of an element by the presence of another one. Find it in the repetitive element of your mind, in the twist, the distortion, the opacity. In the supposedly redundant. In luxury? In what needs not to be there? The last thing to come, the first thing to go – as they say. For most anyway. A necessity that begins where all necessity ends – as spoken by Coco But it gives so much pleasure, it is so supremely satisfying, even if only for a while. Little nothings. Doing nothing, like smoking. Cigarettes are sublime – or so they say. Just don’t take pleasure in them too loudly, too obviously. Too much pleasure sparks up envy, resentment and disgust. We can’t have equality based on that. Like looking at a Russian billionnaire buying a Mercedes covered entirely with Swarovski crystals.

I hear that some now talk of »ethical luxury«, of »deep luxury«. Which sounds like alcohol-free beer or if you’re French: cheese from non-pasteurized milk. A product deprived (is that the right word?) of its supposedly malignant property. Guilt-free luxury (think Stella McCartney, etc.). The bad needs to be immediately countered, even with a clash of opposites in one product: you’ll have a beer, but no alcohol. There is something utterly false about this. Close to luxury posing as restraint (in delirious amounts of cashmere): Luxury or restraint? Yes, please!

(My notions about luxury are perhaps best seen and explained by two examples. One is the film (or Isak Dinesen story) Babette’s Feast (you’ll see when you see it, from danger to its religious aspect, even with a reconciliatory side), the other I will give now. Take a dream, a dream may be an obvious wish, yet completely distorted. You are freezing and starving, caught in the snow of the North Pole. You fall asleep. But you don’t simply dream of a bed, and a piece of bread. Simple food or shelter. No, your wish is an alibi for true fulfillment, for dreaming about a bowl of caviar and a four-poster bed.)

So…

Giving pleasure. Selling pleasure. Controlling via pleasure. Now take a look at this fashion cornucopia. Is this the opposite: unabashed pleasure?

Vuitton Spring Summer 08

You can almost imagine her saying: »Come closer, don’t be afraid, I won’t hurt you.« Then take a look:

Vuitton Spring Summer 08

Galliano Spring Summer 08

Treacy for McQueen Spring Summer 08

Walking piles of fabric, of layers, colors, accessories, makeup. Saturation, sensation (as in: attack on the senses), and a certain flatness, even fading. It won’t last. Desire is here just to promote and sustain itself, not the objects it picks along its curvy ways.

You don’t have to feel guilty.

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