After a Fashion: Kays Catalogue, Modernism and

Fashion Persuasion
Modernity, Modernism & Consumerism:
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The idea of modernity encapsulates the progress of a society from

being primitive, through various stages, such as enlightenment, arriving
at a modern age one characterized by industrialization and through
to post-modern age of globalization.
Feathersone, Mike. COSUMERISM. The Body in Consumer Culture.
Enjoy pleasure. People will always need reassurance due too
consumerism.
Kays: Body is treated like an appliance inner beauty = outer beauty.
Inner health is confirmed by outer appearance.

Fashion & Persuasion:

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Peter York, NYT: Fashion had its own establishment and in this setup they had dictators who set the lines for everyone to follow.

Psychology: Emotional Weight:

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Edward Bernays: Public Relations.

Deployed Freudian psychoanalysis and crowd psychology.
Ballet Russes American tour in 1915.
Lucky Stripe 1934 green packet.
Walter Dill Scott: The Psychology of Advertising, 1908.
Ads should not describe the product but its pleasurable effects.
Alfred Poffenberger: Psychology in Advertising.

Reasons Why Advertising vs Suggestion Advertising:

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Use/Price: Convenience
Image of product: Aura eg. Fisher Body Corp
Discreet product: Ensemble eg. Vanity Kodak
Advertiser: Sylist eg. Paige
Pictorial literalism: Expression/Symbolism
Copy and Illustration: Concern with Layout

Atmospheric Ads:
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Tactic sought to jolt the potential customer into a new consciousness

by enacting dramatic episodes of social failures and accusing
judgments.

Debates In Graphic Design:

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Saxon Mills: The full use of the suggestion idea demands a

specialized understanding of the three aspects of an advertisement
Illustration, Typography and copy. The New Idea in Advertising, 1923.
Crawfords: Ashley Havinden The designer and copywriter
collaborators in evolving a visual rhetoric that affects the symbolic
meaning of the garment advertised.
Adquisitor:

Modernism:
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Gathered pace in 1850, proposing new forms of art on the grounds that
they are more appropriate to the present time.
Therefore it is characterized by constant innovation and a rejection of
conservative values such as the realistic depiction of the world.
This led to experiments with form and to an emphasis on processes
and materials.
Modernist Appropriations:
1. The Bias Factor: dominance of diagonal line to give dynamic affect
(Rectangular layouts didnt project vitality or give sensation of motion)
2. The Kinetic Silhouette: The Off Centre asymmetric axis creates
a factor of tension or suspense
3. Discontinuities/Fragmentations: Unresolved tensions which where
completed by the audience by buying the products.
4. Simplicity: Sans Serif, Breathing Space, Uncluttered Layout.
5. Expressive Distortion: Rather than capture nature, modern art
reflected on spatial and psychic relations through abstract and
symbolic representation.
6. Flattening out of Space: Lots of white space, use of colors or
breathing space. Less is more.
7. Photography: Objectivity implies rationality.
Beggarstaff Brothers Girl on a Sofa, 1895. Abstracted treatment of
form, flattened out space, unmodulated color.

Shaping Taste:
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Marxist theory, conflict approach taste and ideology.

Mass taste & Fashion: Fashion induces a change in mass taste.
Masculinity: Masculinity is not given it is created and manipulated by
film, magazines, advertising and of course, clothing.
Wolfganf Fritz Haug (1986):
Human sensuality is molded and exploited by advertising.
Style (Tastes) are cultivated for profit.
The profit mechanism produces a tendency, which keeps the image of
what is masculine, and mainly is a state of flux.
Interpellation & Looking