Danger in the Path of Chic: Violence in Fashion between the Wars

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During the interwar years, a proliferation of violence encroached upon the glossy, idealistic world of fashion: from the curiously common appearance of dismembered heads in fashion illustration, to seemingly torturous techniques and devices advertised by beauty imagery, even extending to garments designed to look assaulted and destroyed. Danger in the Path of Chic brings this disturbing imagery to light for the first time, proposing new directions for historians of fashion, violence and culture in the interwar years. Concentrating on London, Paris and New York as fashion centres and political allies, the volume explores why horror manifested itself in this way, at this time, and in a sphere that is usually perceived as being built on fantasy and escape. In doing so, Danger in the Path of Chic situates fashion within the very real social, psychological, economic and political traumas of the period.

Reviews

In this fascinating and highly readable book, Lucy Moyse Ferreira connects fashion to war, politics, psychoanalysis and art, showing how a sense of historical crisis permeated every aspect of fashion in the interwar years, from beauty advertising to haute couture. * Caroline Evans, Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London, UK *
With lively and sophisticated writing, Danger in the Path of Chic offers a valuable transnational study of womens fashion and beauty in the interwar years. Moyse Ferreiras interweaving of psychoanalysis with other art movements reflects the trauma of the time period and how high-fashion provided an avenue by which to process those terrors. * Elizabeth Matelski, Endicott College, USA *
With her psychoanalytic discussion of the interwar period, Lucy Moyse Ferreira smartly dissects a wide array of media (including art, fashion, literature, advertising, film, and more). Showing how the violence of World War II consistently lingered throughout the Western World, she successfully argues that a threatening sensibility affected womens bodies and their display in public through overt and coded means. Moyse Ferreira manages to weave a number of disparate media to create a coherent and synthesized view of the undercurrent of violence in womens experiences in the dark spaces between the major world wars. * Emily Newman, Texas A&M University-Commerce, USA *

Author Bio

Lucy Moyse Ferreira is Lecturer in Fashion Media and Digital Innovation at London College of Fashion, University of the Arts London, UK.