{"id":505603,"date":"2021-04-13T00:00:00","date_gmt":"1970-01-01T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/numero.com\/non-classifiee-2\/interview-with-virgil-abloh-diversity-in-fashion-is-not-a-marketing-technique-2\/"},"modified":"2021-04-13T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"1970-01-01T00:00:00","slug":"interview-with-virgil-abloh-diversity-in-fashion-is-not-a-marketing-technique-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/numero.com\/en\/non-classifiee\/interview-with-virgil-abloh-diversity-in-fashion-is-not-a-marketing-technique-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Interview with Virgil Abloh : \u201cDiversity in fashion is not a marketing technique\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Virgil Abloh\/Alessio Segala.<\/figcaption>\n <\/figure>\n \n

Since launching his brand Off- White in 2013,<\/strong> Virgil Abloh has spread his vision well beyond the limits of fashion, establishing himself as more of a visionary than a mere designer. The gen-Z idol, who was born in Rockford, Illinois, does it all: fashion, design, art, architecture, music… Postmodern in his approach, he envisages the creative industries in a radically new way, brilliantly mixing disciplines and cultural and artistic references to reinvent our times. Rather than creating collections, furniture or artworks from his own subjectivity, he promotes work that borrows and takes its cues from existing fragments of our culture.<\/p>\r\n\r\n

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Indeed it was as a DJ \u2013 mixing tracks,<\/strong> reworking sounds to create new pieces \u2013 that he began to express himself as an adolescent. In his creative approach, this brilliant artistic director operates like an electro-music producer, starting out with samples and prototypes that he looks at anew. A founding component in hip-hop since it emerged in the late 70s, the practice of sampling \u2013 composing a track from bits of existing music \u2013 became mainstream in the 90s, with all sorts of artists quoting in unexpected ways other people\u2019s melodies or lyrics, often in reference to their wider cultural meaning. When we spoke to him, Abloh concurred. \u201cPerhaps the explosion of hip-hop should be seen as a metaphor for artistic democratization. Composing with samples, these fragments of culture, is to understand that creation is unlimited.\u201d Since nothing is created in a vacuum, each creator is inspired by those that preceded them, by those they admired: they build their own work on this heritage. As Abloh himself put it in the notes that accompanied his first Louis Vuitton runway show, \u201c3% of novelty is enough to completely transform an existing garment or accessory.\u201d<\/p>\r\n\r\n

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Today his work is exhibited at the Art Institute of Chicago,<\/strong> he is invited by prestigious universities such as Harvard to talk about his vision and is interviewed by the most prestigious art magazines. Everyone wants a piece of this charismatic orator, an emblem of an epoch in which pop and academic culture are coming closer and mixing in the profusion of data and images that characterizes our digital world. In this new paradigm, Abloh, who analyses creative fields transversally, acts as a thinker and perhaps even a prophet for a planet in flux. His big- gest gift is his natural affinity with the Zeitgeist, his ability to tap into the elusive \u201cspirit of the times.\u201d<\/p>\r\n\n

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