Not only does European style come to Ukraine, but Ukrainian designers, too, present their collections at key fashion weeks, in particular those on the axis New York-London-Milan-Paris. Meanwhile the Ukrainian fashion guru Lilia Pustovit, who has long gained fame in Europe, created a new market for our fashion.
Her brand “Poustovit” will be the first to represent the Ukrainian fashion community at the Georgia Fashion Week and Riga Fashion Week. Yet in Pustovit’s case, it is not purely a matter of fashion. For her new spring/summer 2011 collection, Pustovit used drawings by the famous Ukrainian artist Pavlo Makov. In his commentary to The Day Makov explained that cooperation between a fashion designer and a painter is the result of harmony between two artists.
“I feel there is no difference between design, art, painting, or fashion. Smart fashion is sublime art, beautiful design is sublime art, and so is beautiful painting,” emphasized Makov. “The effect of good food, or a pretty dress, or a beautiful picture is the same, if it is really executed by an artist. And this is very important.
“If your food is cooked by an artist chef, it is the same as if you came to a picture gallery. In my view, it is all the same. This is to say that there is art, and there is non-art. That’s all there is to it. And it doesn’t matter what you do, whether you operate and turn a cripple into an able-bodied person or anything else.
“I have always opposed the division between sublime art and design, which allegedly is something else. My cooperation with Lilia Pustovit is based on very simple, human foundations. Lilia got acquainted with me because she had liked my work. If we take a look at art history we’ll see that great artists were not loathe to make clothes and even weapons, like Leonardo da Vinci.
“That is why I think that ‘how’ matters more than ‘what.’ If this ‘how’ has an artistic dimension, then it makes sense. If it is good for nothing, nothing will come of it, no matter what you call it: fashion, design, or art. I think there is a certain happy connection in it — for what makes up the quality of our lives? It’s the quality of our communication: who you have talked with today, what you talked about, and if that other person understood you.”
The artistic tandem Pustovit-Makov is significant not only for fashion, but also in a much broader context. It is important for society, as a sort of cure for disillusionment and apathy. Because, if artists continue to create paintings, and designers keep producing images, and moreover, if they find one another and start artistic unions, it means that there is no room for disillusionment, and there can be none.
The next issues of The Day will carry more details on the 27th Ukrainian Fashion Week.
