Unforgettable Ruled-Out Talents
May 08, 2008
| Selecting the finalists for ITS is a very special moment, as you can well imagine. What is probably less obvious is that it also stands as one of the saddest moments of the year, and that is quite easily explained: we pick about 45-50 contestants for the finals but we are forced to exclude more than 1000. There are always a number of beautiful projects that don't make it through the Preselections and it's a heartbreaking experience for people like us who love creativity so much... When the portfolios start to arrive in our offices in March we go through each one of them, and we have already told you several times about what a privileged experience it is for us, since we're allowed to explore the dreams of young people from all over the world. This also means that before the Jury arrives in April we already have a complete view of everything that's arrived, and it's impossible not to make up our own mind on who we believe will be selected. But our opinion doesn't always match perfectly with what the Jury decides! That's the down side of selections, especially in an event like ITS where there's so much material to judge and not enough space for every project that deserves to reach the finals. The Jury has a really tough job. Every year there's enough good projects to organise not just one ITS but at least three or four, so the jurors find themselves in a situation where there are a number of equally interesting projects they have to choose from. It must also be said that every jury is different because part of the judgement process depends on professional experience and part on personal taste: in our opinion, if two different juries were to each pick let's say 20 projects, there would be at least 5 or 6 differences. What we want to do here is to pay homage to some of the beautiful projects we received that did not make it to the finals. These are just a few examples, chosen randomly from a number of others for which we shed a tear when they were not selected... |
The moment we met Iacopo Calamandrei we understood that someone special was in front of us. Very quiet and reserved, he's an Italian studying at the Royal College of Arts with a very interesting background of studies in art & drawing and an incredibly long internship period at Alexander McQueen, which means he definitely has no problem to work like crazy. We fell in love with his visionary futuristic collection inspired by the Renaissance and were almost tempted to trick the jury and slip his portfolio in together with the finalists...At Royal College we also met with Lisa Uhlenbrock. Her toiles were so perfectly executed we would have believed they were the final garments had she not told us. Besides the excellent technical realisation, her menswear collection struck us because of the overload of beautiful details inspired by trompe l'oeil and by the use of familiar pieces in unexpected ways. For example, she turned a travelling suit bag into a perfectly wearable - and wonderful - raincoat maintaining its bag functionality. And her portfolio is simply beautiful. |
 Roxane Baines studies at La Cambre in Brussels. The collection she presented for ITS#SEVEN was inspired by women who spend most of their time travelling and flying from one airport to another. Everything that comes to mind when you think of airports was in her clothes, assembled with great taste, elegance and irony: the colours of famous packs of cigarettes, international newspapers, stuffed neck pieces that border on an ethnical jewel and a sleeping cushion for the plane...we loved her project! A great surprise (comparable to when we discovered he had not been selected...) was Qin Yuke's portfolio that arrived from China. We don't normally have talents of this sort from the far east. Most of the time good Asian designers have studied in Europe. Qin is an exception, and what an exception!! A collection based on one of the most common themes in this year's edition, pregnancy. Outfits full of details that recall Japanese origami and cell structure or elementary organic life...When he was not selected we felt a sting... |
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Ian Bennet's millinery seems to come out of an alternative, futuristic version of the 1920s. On the border between fashion accessories and art pieces, the shapes of his hats got our attention the moment we laid our eyes on his portfolio and were already picturing them in the ITS#ACCESSORIES exhibition in the Ex-Pescheria Centrale. It will remain a dream in our minds. For now. The shapes of the bags by Teodora Lazarova initially reminded us of Michal Sokol's (ITS#FIVE) accessories collection. Teodora's bags, however, originated from a different concept, analysing the unbreakable bond between people and the objects they carry with them. Also, the insertion of fastenings in the bags was both original and functional, and we would have loved to see them realised and on display. |
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Talking about photography, we had fallen in love with the project by Asami Horiike from Tokyo Polytechnic University, that questioned the importance that people place on art and the struggles that artists often face to give sense to their work. The only important sense for Asami is following the instinct of the heart and enjoying what one is doing. If then it becomes art, it depends on the viewer. And her apparently simple photos hide poetry and beauty inside. Kozue Takagi is from the same school as Asami. Her project was made of photos shot to her by friends, family and strangers and it resulted in a research of how "the others" see her. And it was really interesting to see how each photo, depending on who shot it, gave a different perspective of Kozue. Everyone sees us in their own personal way. We would have seen Kozue's photos very well in the photo exhibition... 
There is a very precise meaning hidden in this article, and it goes to all of those who enrolled but did not make it to the finals: you must never give up. Perseverance is very important among the heavenly sins of a young talent. And remember that we do not forget you. We meet students in schools and they wonder how on earth do we remember the collection they enrolled 4 years before in detail. One of the reasons of our editorial project "The Seismographer" and of ITS#ARCHIVE is that we wanted to create a place for all the rest of the gorgeous creativity we receive and that up to now was destined to remain hidden.
Please enrol next year, please give us the privilege of viewing an expression of your creativity once again!
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