One of my favourite subjects at university was Anglo-American literature because I had a very open-minded lecturer who always tried to encourage our passions and interests and seemed to be equally supportive to students who liked more traditional works such as Herman Melville’s and people who were into avant-garde or alternative writers like the ones who gathered around the Black Mountain College.
One term we focused on more experimental authors like William Burroughs, so we also got the chance of exploring his connections with Brion Gysin.
My brother knew that I was doing some personal researches on what I was studying, so he brought me back from a record fair a double CD of Moroccan music recorded by Gysin himself.
I actually think he came to regret it pretty soon since, for quite a few weeks, stepping into my bedroom was like entering a Moroccan souk.
Gysin had opened a restaurant in the 50s in Tangier called The Thousand and One Nights (that operated for a short time between the summer and the autumn of 1956) where he presented the best Joujouka musicians and other traditional Moroccan groups specialised in exorcism and trance.
“In 1955 I used to go there every night with my tape-recorder to get as much music as I could. Brion was wildly enthusiastic about the music, but did not like the idea of my recording it. He felt possessive about it, and never missed an opportunity to cough or shout something near the microphone, so that my recording would be imperfect. This did not matter to me, as I had no intention of selling the tapes (Brion imagined that I might),” wrote Paul Bowles in a letter about Gysin’s establishment.
I’m embedding in this post one Joujouka track recorded by Gysin in the 50s. This track is one of the first recordings that came to my mind in June when I first saw two menswear collections, Yves Saint Laurent and Jean Paul Gaultier’s.
The late Saint Laurent was often inspired in his collections by exotic and faraway lands.
In the mid-60s the designer created the iconic Saharienne or safari jacket and launched an Africa-inspired collection.
His Autumn 1969 dresses - sensual versions of abayas completed with head scarves and enriched by galvanised copper bodices and waist sculptures by Claude Lalanne - were inspired by Morocco, a country Saint Laurent first visited in 1966 and gradually came to consider his second homeland.
The designer and Pierre Bergé purchased three houses in Morocco, including the Majorelle gardens.
The late Yves Saint Laurent was inspired in his works by the colours of Northern Africa and once stated that it was only when he visited Morocco that he realised his chromatism perfectly matched that of zelliges, zouacs and kaftans: “I owe my boldness to
this country. I feel like this culture has become my own culture: I wasn’t simply content to import it, but I also wanted to integrate, transform and adapt the heritage of Morocco”.
Yves Saint Laurent’s current creative director Stefano Pilati seems to have a different kind of fascination for exotic lands.
Rather than looking at colours, he went back to a sort of different atmosphere in his menswear S/S 2011 that evoked in many ways the contrasts between the East and the West and that called back to mind images portraying Gysin or Bowles in Morocco in the early 50s.
In fact if you ever saw images portraying Brion Gysin and Moroccan painter Hamri, you would get a good idea of the sort of mix Pilati went for in this collection, opting for minimalist and linear designs in a sober palette.
The collection featured sophisticated belted fluid jackets that referenced djellabas and high-waisted trousers echoing in some ways the attire of legionnaires, accessorised with sandals and fezes.
In some cases Morocco was evoked better in the details, such as in the ample silhouettes of shorts and in the subtle leopard prints used for corset-like sashes, while the waistcoats that looked like shirts added an avant-garde touch to the collection.
Jean Paul Gaultier
has always loved to mix influences from different countries together erasing boundaries and often mixing traditions, creating transnational styles, so the Yves Saint Laurent look-alike on the runway was just an ironic reference to Marrakesh.
Morocco was echoed indeed in the sheer djellabas, kaftans and tunics decorated with intricate leather embroideries, matched with tailored jackets and trousers, fabric or leather drop crotch pants, safari jackets, scarves wrapped around the neck or cropped djellabas turned into ponchos, a classic gender-bending trick à la Gaultier.
Shoes were turned into Moroccan slippers, while splashes of paint à la Jackson Pollock on trousers and jackets and long billowing robe-like katftans in 3-D cosmic prints added a touch of fun and irony (View this photo).
Chances are that the Moroccan inspirations seen in these collections will be echoed also in the womenswear collections for the next season.
A couple of years ago the Fondation Pierre Bergé - Yves Saint Laurent organised an exhibition entitled “Une Passion Marocaine”, dedicated to the craftsmanship behind Moroccan dress.
The exhibition included 20th century kaftans in the most extraordinary colours and materials - velvet and silk included - elaborate rare jewellery and tapestry.
If you missed that event and are maybe planning a trip to Morocco for this Autumn, you may have the chance of seeing Saint Laurent’s Morocco-inspired creations exhibited at a retrospective at the Jardin Majorelle in Marrakesh.
Entitled “Yves Saint Laurent and Morocco” and scheduled from November 2010 until March 2011 the event will include over 40 creations by Saint Laurent.
Who knows, maybe the event may end up giving Pilati a good excuse to create some innovative Morocco-inspired looks like the ones Saint Laurent developed with Lalanne.
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