Description
Issue 16 of DSCENE tends to be one in which we allow ourselves to dream. Yet, dreams are what made the artists and creatives we are spotlighting today figure out the future in design, fashion and art industries. What is indeed purely coincidental, this issue is also a story of duos. Photography and design duos have shaped a large portion of DSCENE 16. Firstly, we return to our Los Angeles contributors Mark Williams and Sara Hirakawa for a gloriously captured portfolio of the new-season collections shaping our cover story. These standout pieces from the new collections also come alive thanks to the striking cover star of this DSCENE, Ashley Smith. We’ve also taken the time to contemplate the world we are living in, in a gloriously imaginative portfolio by another of our favourite photography duos, Gus & Lo. In a series of videos and photographs they once again stun in their sci-fi like imagery.
The swift digitisation of our very lives through TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat continues to reshape the perception of the world. Thus for the new issue what we were thinking about were the implications for both designers as well as artists but also those who admire and buy their work. What does it mean for creative industries, this endless replication and instant mirroring of the imagery? Will NFTs put a stop to the freedom we are so used to on the internet? Is it a sign of democratisation, or regulation? Will the global audience still engage in the meta world, where these NFTs might as well push the haves and have nots? In this giant vortex real creativity finds a new meaning, and Daria Shapovalova and Natalia Modenova the founders of DRESSX show us how fashion can thrive in the meta world. While I tend towards the optimistic view of the NFT industry I also comprehend why even young designers choose to emphasise the physical craft of their work. For many breakthrough young designers, while their images influence us in the digital world, their originality is a true manifestation of creativity in the real world. Such is the work of two design duos we were lucky enough to talk with this time. Cosima Gradient and Christa Bösch, the girls from Switzerland behind OTTOLINGER and Sébastien Meyer and Arnaud Vaillant, guys who founded the equally refreshing COPERNI.
But the story of the digital world mixing into reality is also the one of Anna Yang who created AN?AKIKI. A brand whose presence on events as traditional as Milano Fashion Week helped spread the name and creativity throughout the digital realm. Anna talks to our Fashion Director Katarina Djoric about the road from an idea to an actual living and breathing fashion brand. Another spotlight of the issue is artist Wong Ping, hailing from Hong Kong, he masterfully combines his dominance over graphic design in the digital world with traditional forms such as sculpture. His work tells the story of our time, often in a simple yet efficient manner.
