Yohji yamamoto documentary

I just saw this. Found it for 5 dollars shipped online.


Really great. Excellent insight into Yohji's life and thoughts.
I liked seeing how intellectual Yohji is. There are artists out there like Bob Dylan who claim they just create their art without intellectualizing and struggling. Personally I intellectualize most of my actions and interpret the actions of others so it is cool to see that Yohji is on a similar page as myself.

Also I was surprised at how heavily Yohji is influenced by old photographs and the emphasis he out on the faces of the people in these photographs.
anyone know what book that was, the Men of the 20th Century portrait book?



Highly recommended.

It's People of the 20th Century, and it's a photographic series by the German photographer, August Sander.

bought this a few weeks ago and have watched it several times since then...i think i mentioned it in the SF Film & Cinema thread. this movie has given me the only validation i'll ever need in life...and definitely not just speaking in terms of clothing and style. the particular part that struck me most was where he mentioned how after a certain point he no longer cared if anyone understood his style...also the monologues at the beginning and end, the one about how he learned to love the imperfections and flaws of other people because that's what made them human. Especially relevant in an era where everyone is so concerned with image and consistency rather than just embrace life as it is with its constant ups and downs. my only wish is that they focused more on him as a person and left some of the fashion collection designing stuff trimmed down. it was definitely a bit on the short end.

does this have an official title?

or is it just "yohji yamamoto documentary"?

Notebook on Cities and Clothes directed by Wim Wenders.

Your life is incomplete without this:

http://www.amazon.com/August-Sander-...3023252&sr=8-1

The price is ridiculously low too...

thanks. I think I will love this as I'm more interested in the conceptual PoV of clothes and designers than the actual garments. plus I love Wim Wenders

less than $5 shipped on amazon, cant go wrong there.

I also ordered a copy after seeing this thread. I definitely look forward to what Yohji has to say about his inspiration. I paid 7.94 on ebay shipped, I think it should be worth it.

glad some people are buying it after seeing this thread.


Another big thing which really struck me is the relationship between art, time and reproduction/replication.

Music (recordings and scores) and books are a couple big ones which can be almost endlessly reproduced particularly with the digital age. And with paintings there is a strong infrastructure of museums and even when paintings do "disappear" into private collections it is likely there are high quality images in archives/online/in books and even more likely that the painting will be put into a public collection upon the death of the owner.

Clothing though really can just disappear. People consume it and then it is gone save for photos of runway shows or catalogs/lookbooks which really fail to capture much of a garments facets... one of the main so called problems with online discussion of clothing and fashion; most of the commentors have never seen the clothes in real life, fewer tried it on, worn it/lived with it or seen someone else wear it.


Will watch again. The more I think about Notebook on Cities and Clothes the more I learn about it, clothes, architecture, art, life.

eh, almost annoying none of my real life friends have similar relationship with clothes as me to discuss this. that is what internet message boards are for I suppose.

Holy Shit!
I've been wanting this for a while, and must be retarded because I had only found the full seven volumes on a German site, sold out, for something like 250 euros plus shipping.

Do you know if that is a nice edition?

yep, that last point you mentioned is why i keep up with online message boards relating to clothing, there isn't anyone i can discuss this passion of mine with outside the net. My parents are the closest people i can think of but as they have gotten older they have less and less interest in clothing/the fashion industry, particularly after having spent a few decades working in it i guess they just got burnt out and wanted to move on to something different. another part of the documentary that i found fascinating was Yohji's obsession with images that seemed to have no clear link to his actual work. Maybe some traces of it were evident in a few of the Sander photographs, but more importantly it seemed he was trying to tap into an intangible mentality when it came to the wearer and his clothing, as if the two were not distinct but rather meshed into a single identity that translated to every other aspect of their lives whether it be work, function, or necessity due to surroundings. With regards to that i think that is the theme he has been trying to express to the world through his work, the idea that he mentioned about wishing people to wear his clothes as if they were a natural extension of their lives, instead of wearing them as part of a 'fashion' discourse. To that extent, i now find it amusing that of all designers, Yohji seems to be one for whom his admirers/followers/detractors place a lot of intellectual value on when discussing, when in fact i think Yohji's intention is to strip away all that pretense and overanalysis. His clothes are in fact one of the labels out there which I think take the least amount of thought to wear.

haha I didnt even notice the original thread date!!

It's the same as the German edition. Terrific value for the price, excellent layout and beautiful paper. Frankly this is the only edition worth getting and the price makes it ridiculously attractive.