“…The Renwick Ruins, an abandoned smallpox hospital still standing on Roosevelt Island, NYC. Something that once was, a haunted romanticism, evoking memories of its past…”
Gauzy cretonne, dusty chandeliers, and a phantasmal energy set a pleasantly disturbing vibe for Sally LaPointe’s SS12 runway. The air inside LaPointe’s usual West Chelsea venue, thick with artificial smog, rendered the typical pre-show fervor murky and indiscernible.
The designer’s familiar, monolithic silhouettes populated this evening’s showing, however this time with a less organic and more deliberate concept behind them.
The showing embodied a certain sense of finality – that an event had just taken place here, somebody once occupied this space, or at one time these objects served a different purpose. Now, the viewer cannot obtain closure from its current state, there is no resolution and no reassurance. LaPointe’s sepulchral forms occupy a space with their own more subtle brand of preterition; they loom like specters, ghostly forms with a palpable presence.
