Multimedia Artist César Talks Intersectionality Between Fashion and Art

In 1989, L’OFFICIEL released its 752nd issue — the very first to be devoted entirely to art and exploring its lasting connection with fashion. The Marseillais sculptor César Baldaccini, known mononymously as César, was invited to create a completely original object for the cover. Celebrated for his work using metallic compression—including a nipple-shaped sculpture currently housed at Maison Azzedine Alaïa—the result was “Cube journaux. Titre L’Officiel.” A trompe l’oeil, cube-shaped sculpture, is only 90 x 100 x 10 centimeters and is made of more than one hundred covers of L’OFFICIEL, which had been gifted to the artist for the project.

In an interview for the issue, César opened with a bold statement: “Fashion is a spectacle. Fashion is a painting.” Counting couturiers like Sonia Rykiel, Thierry Mugler, and Paco Rabanne as close friends, the artist was no stranger to the runway in his lifetime, often attending shows and drawing on his own perceived interactions between fashion and art. About his friends, he said: “Sense of colour, relationship of shapes in space, technical mastery, some designers are true artists…When I look at a collection, I see the portrait of the one who presents it.” While the art world often flinched at incorporating fashion into their discipline at the time, César welcomed it.

When asked to reflect on the relationship between fashion and art, César continued: “Art is life, and both have taken to the streets.” The sculptor went on to describe the importance of materials for both the artist and designer, noting that fabrics were the basis of fashion and defined its outcome; for César, it was the metal and presses that he used to sculpt his pieces that formed the foundation of his work. It is a shared understanding for César and L’OFFICIEL that fashion is an art form all its own.