Fashion Film Festival Tbilisi created an illuminating collaboration between Tbilisi-based designer Lado Bokuchava and young emerging talent Mariam Saknelashvili a visual artist with distinctive, unique vision, in the format of the very first Pre-Edition.
This collaboration intended to explore the vast space where costume design can be implemented and how this process works for both the artist and designer and also to make a commentary on what in general can be viewed as a Fashion Film and how broad can its possibilities and limits be.
Apart from being host to this collaboration FFFTbilisi decided to conduct interviews for both parties, for them to provide their insights and their work practices.
Mariam Saknelashvili is a young, emerging visual artist, who sparked interest through her imaginative, dream-like illustrations. In her works you can find it all: some glimpses of reality, fairy-tale-like creatures and utopian yet utterly sentimental and personal novels.
Lado Bokuchava founder and creative director behind the brand “Lado Bokuchava” – characterized by combination of bold radical colours and silhouettes, the design pieces are distinguished by retro-futuristic aesthetics and eclectic elements.
Mariam Saknelashvili: I try to filter things all the time, to remove and forget unnecessary things from mind and to bring everything to a simpler and more essential level. In my case, costume design comes quite naturally, I draw humans and when I don’t want them to be naked, I would want them to wear something, it has been numerous times that I finished and then I had to make a decision what to wear for them, at some places they are wearing versions of my everyday clothes.
Lately I got interested in what is left from staying alone with yourself and how this process creates your own personality – your own self. As, your personality doesn’t exist as something pure and only yours, and your personality is created by environment, past and present. All this shapes you. So, I have that in my work as well, environment and personality – a character is created by these little details.
This summer I went near a river, for a very short period of time but it had a very strong hold on me, after that I always want to express the experience of the river
When I see works from last year or maybe two, I feel the distance from my characters, like this character or that character is no longer with me as I have changed myself.
Lado Bokuchava : When in my childhood I decided to create clothes, I always wanted to make things that are related to utopia, mystical movies. Even now when I work on a collection, I still want to make something that doesn’t include fabric in it, I want to experiment with a material that has more effects, more possibilities that reality provides, animation and graphics, and other mediums like that, make that possible
In my childhood, in the 90-ies in the suburbs of Kutaisi, there was nothing but TV, neither my parents were well accustomed with art and I had no one who would tell “Oh you like fashion? Go read this, go watch that”. The only thing was TV, by the way there I saw the documentary about Christian Dior, and that was the very first visualization of a designer, if I won’t take into consideration my mom of course, who always was well-dressed, not in particular in my style as she was always classic and minimalistic, but always well-dressed.
I see a real person and the only thing I do to prepare is to print the spaces, places and things, where I imagine this particular person to be and interact with.
I love that my clothes for someone could be very futuristic but for me it could be religious or gothic. Also, it could be dream-like and utopian that couldn’t be detected at first glance. In fashion and generally in art, I love that something specific, an object, even clothes or character can be perceived differently by different people. I love to mix things that are irrelevant to each other, without the irrelevance, I simply get bored. I can’t take the look too seriously, there should be some fun aspect to it, I have to make fun of it and the final result should be a little annoying.
I really liked Mariam’s works, I think it comes very close to me. There are many fairy-tale-like, at some point fatal elements, that is why I really loved the idea of this collaboration.
Even Mariam’s characters, I like how they look, their facial features, I love the worlds she creates in novels,the stories that happen there, at some point absurd and gothic, and, I love gothic so much, that’s why on my behalf collaboration went so easy, apart from the fact that we both were chosen without consulting, I think this collaboration is very interesting.
Mariam: I would never think that a designer would create costumes for my characters, that’s why it’s such a great experience for me. I like Lado’s clothes, I like that he always adds details or color so that it annoys or disturbs you, its uncommon but when you look at it, you know that something is not right, but you can’t understand what’s wrong, I like that a lot about Lado’s work. I think it’s a challenge, of course it is, as it’s not my vision it's someone else’s and I have to adjust to both of us, I mean it’s not hard as there still are shared interests and common grounds.
The project supported by Tbilisi Hall