Earth, Water, Air, and Fire: the four Elements of Fashion
International Fashion
Conference
organised by Universitą Iuav di Venezia
March 16-17,
2023
Venice, Italy
Sun, air, water and
soil are in most of the clothes we wear. In the era of ecological crisis, this
international conference aims to investigate the new paradigms of fashion
cultures through the four archetypal elements of matter. By doing so, it shifts
the attention towards the material and sensory aspects of fashion, features
that have been largely neglected by fashion studies over the past forty years.
This approach fits in the current debate on the ‘material turn’
inspired by de-centering the human and re-centering matter and the materiality
of things, objects, technologies, and bodies. The conference proposes to
analyse this ontological shift through the redefinition of the substance of
fashion and its history. In Western and non-Western cultures matter is
conceived as a coexistence of multiple elements following a tradition that
includes, among others, the cosmological treatise of Aristotle, the Hinduist
and Buddhist meditations on the ‘primary material elements’
(mahabhutas), and Jābir ibn Hayyān’s alchemy. The conference
takes place in Venice, a city that emerged from water through a process of
significant anthropisation, and in which life’s rhythms and movements
historically coexist and are dependent on a critically changing environment.
venue
Palazzo Badoer, San Polo 2468, 30125 Venezia
some sessions are available
online: to join the conference online, sign up with the links that can be found
in the programme.
press
release (Italian) >>
poster >>
scientific
coordinators and convenors
Anneke Smelik, Radboud
University of Nijmegen
Alessandra Vaccari, Universitą Iuav di Venezia
scientific
committee
Maude Bass-Krueger,
Ghent University
Maria Claudia Bonadio, Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora
Danielle Bruggeman
ArtEZ, University of the Arts
Patrizia Calefato, Universitą degli studi di Bari Aldo Moro
Serkan Delice, London
College of Fashion UAL
Jeannine Diego,
Virginia Commonwealth University
Kyoko Koma, Meiji
University
Llewellyn Negrin,
University of Tasmania
Kirsi Niinimäki, Aalto
University
Agnčs Rocamora, London
College of Fashion UAL
organising and technical committee
Greta Bosello, Universitą Iuav di Venezia
Sandra Coppola, Universitą Iuav di Venezia, Universitą degli Studi della Campania Luigi Vanvitelli
Paolo Franzo, Universitą Iuav di Venezia, Universitą degli studi di Firenze
Clizia Moradei, Universitą Iuav di Venezia
book of abstracts
editor
Mariįh Majolo
in collaboration
with
Iuav School of
Doctoral Studies - Bembo Officina Editorial
Iuav Master in Fashion
and Visual Arts
Fashion Futuring
Research Group
Research cluster
Ecological Art Practices at NICHE (Universitą Ca’ Foscari Venezia)
© Tabinotabi, 2021. ph: Camilla Glorioso, Filippo Soffiati
