(via Madame Grès)
After browsing images within THE RED LIST (a website devoted to the visual arts), one thing struck me like a canon—-a movie is the hub of it all!
Fashion stands alone as visual, paintings stand alone as visual, architecture, design, photography—-all visual. But, if you’ll notice, all of these visual arts can be found in film, which is, itself, a visual art. So, could it be that film is the most elevated of all art-forms? It’s quite a heavy statement to make, but I think so! In fact, dance is the closest think to matching movies in that way, being that it can be audible, visual, and narrative.
However controversial it may be to claim that film is the most advanced art-form, there is no denying that it is the most in-depth. Hence, just looking at this 1940s fashion photo by designer, Madame Gres, one can totally envision this as a movie-still!
So then, is it any wonder that films seemed to have started off more primarily concerned with visual art than with narrative? Take the comedians of the silent era, for example. The sketches that Laurel & Hardy, Buster Keaton, and Charlie Chaplin were in were designed to make you laugh. The story was secondary, a mere device which may or may not have been developed for the sole purpose of enhancing the quality of what was seen.
By the same token, when the sound era finally came along, arguably the most successful genre was the musical. Again, the story would have been comprised to incorporate elements of the visual, not the other way around.
So, what does all this have to do with the photo included with this article? Well, the photo, along with this article, illustrates how easily we associate certain visual art with the movies, even when a certain image is not necessarily part of that niche.
The people of the first 60 or 70 years of the industry seemed to anticipate this tenancy and called upon all the best fashion designers, choreographers, musicians, and even cosmetologists, like the legendary Max Factor, to come and enhance the field of film. That strategy worked so well, that now, it is virtually impossible to dissociate the other art-forms from it, even when they are done independently of the medium.
One easy way to describe it is that movies are a means-to-an-end, meant as a way of evoking all art, absolutely, once, for all, and for all time. That is why film-preservation is so important. Because it’s about so much more than the obvious—-hence that picture up there.
But, make no mistake. I do not wish to imply that film is simply the representation of other art-forms. No, quite the contrary is true. In fact, the most important thing to remember about this whole discussion is that movies have not only benefited from the other arts, but that the other arts have benefited from them as-well. And, the fashion industry is definite proof of that—-hence, that picture up there.
So, anyone with a taste for the arts must thereby appreciate the film industry for inadvertently helping to keep all the elements alive. This, to me, is what makes it the highest art-form.
NOTE: If you’re a lover of all art-forms and would therefore like to support film-preservation efforts, you may do so here.
