Anarchist Aesthetics: Robert Kupisz for Spring Summer 2015

In the late 1970s, punk was an adrenaline shock directly into the arm of both music and fashion. The impact on fashion alone was immense: pioneered by Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm McLaren and extended by an array of young fashion-forward fans and musicians, the fashion iconography of punk is now firmly a part of our cultural and visual language. Since its birth as a subcultural movement, it has provided inspiration to countless collections, with designers seeking to add their own stamp and reconfigure the original powerful imagery of punk into their own creative universe. In Polish designer Robert Kupisz’s seventh collection, “Anarchy Spring Summer 2015,” the base visual elements of punk are referenced and reconstructed into a punk fashion sensibility that is at once familiar but still possess a dynamic and visceral energy.

Featuring clothing for men and women as well as a variety of unisex looks, this is a collection whose pieces are united by their sense of aggression. Models stalk the runaway with clipped, sharp movements, eyes are shrouded by smoky black eyeliner and hair is artfully backcombed and tousled. Red and black are the dominant colors with stabs of grey and white.

Men’s clothes are a harmonious wearable blend. Black skinny jeans are rendered dynamic by asymmetrically placed zips to break up the legs line, bomber jackets zips running from the neck across the shoulders could unzip the arm itself, and red graphic singlets are emblazoned with crude drawings of crossed out bombs. The women’s looks are no less aggressive: off-the-shoulders short dresses look faded and pre-worn, flannel sleeveless dresses are belted high on the waist, while tight black leather dresses complete the modern rebels uniform. The occasional flashes of leopard print and flannel—classic punk visual patterns—break up the otherwise solid colors of the collection. Ominous ski masks on both female and male models are studded with small fabric badges referencing modern illicit methods of rebellion.