How to do what? : Jean Paul Gaultier, ‘Camp’ and Postmodernity in the Music Video for the 1989 single “How to do that”
Released on September 11th 1989, Jean Paul Gaultier’s music video for his single “Aow Tou dou Zat (How to do that)” is an embodiment of postmodern fashion. Coined by Mr Gaultier, the record can be described as “House couture” (Jones, 1988), with the relation of fashion and music coming together in an amalgamation of dress, set and personality. The song was produced by Tony Mansfield, published by Polygram records in 1989, and the video directed by Jean-Baptiste Mondino. Aesthetic Postmodernism underlines a relationship between semiotics and culture. In semiology, the signifier stands for the signified. In the previous modernism, there is a guarantor meaning in the form of hierarchies such as social class, morality or political alliances. In postmodernism, the signified is perceptive. Connotations between the signifier and the signified are informed by your own individual allegory and alliances (Barnard, 2020). Jean Baudrillard argues that post – modernist signs don't signify, but in fact, they are self-referential (Rocamora and Smelik, 2019, pg. 217). Objects and commodities become elements in a system of signification in a code-like form. In fashion, signs – not material goods, are driven by desire – one that is insatiable because it has been founded on ‘lack’. This connects to Ferdinand de Saussure’s study of semiotics and language as a ‘social institution’ whereby “considering rites, customs, etc as signs, it will be possible [...] to see them in a new perspective“ explained through the laws of semiology. Semiotics as the linguistics of signs allows us to understand the fashion code in this postmodernist video.
Fashion, out of all the art form, arguably excels in its ability to challenge conventions of the body, gender and sexuality as physical garment or metaphorical theory. Susan Sontag’s essay “Notes on ‘Camp’” provides a framework for the analysis of the all-encompassing world of Jean Paul Gaultier's “How to do That”. The word “camp”, according to oxford dictionary, by definition is something that is “Exaggerated, affected, over the top, esp. in a knowing or playful way; (deliberately) not restrained by traditional or prevailing ideas of good taste or decorum.” (Oed.com, 2023). Christopher Isherwood’s The World in the Evening introduces us to a more fundamental feeling of camp: “it is the psychological paradox of High Camp, which – by means of “fun and artifice and elegance” - makes a way of its own into issues of the utmost weight and concern [ ... ] It makes fun out of them.” (Bolton et al., 2019). Here, camp is an enacted verb. It contains multitudes that contradict ironically and authentically, giving up hard factuality for narrative imagination with “warped coding and decoding” (Bolton et al., 2019). The camp masquerade manifested the subversive politics that gender constructivism and queer theory would shape into academic agender. The relationship between queerness and camp is important in dissecting this music video. In the latter half of the 19th century, early 20th century, ‘camp’ was homosexual lingo to communicate amongst those in the know (Cleto, 1997). Innuendos and camp-codes became communications amongst the queer community. As a postmodernist production that is multifaceted with music, dance, fashion and styling, “How to do that” can be described as ‘camp’. We can deconstruct the relations to gender, sexuality and body politics through the different camp-codes. This post-structuralist approach is the very notion of camp. Here, the subjectivity, forms and fragmentation of styles diffuse boundaries and when the insider/outsider of social legitimacy is ironically inverted (Bolton et al., 2019), it becomes ‘camp’ in its presentation.
Figure 1 shows a female model wearing the black cage dress. The caged dress is implied to be restricted. The skirts' structure is conical, worn with black slip underneath and a skeletal bodice with coned cups. For Gaultier, the physicality of a cage corset in his designs is not one of restriction but “armors that reveal the power of seduction” (Cleto, 1997; Jean-Paul Gaultier and Thierry-Maxime Loriot, 2022), a purposeful protection and stronghold to license feminine strength. One on hand, Gaultier's fashioning of the female body is one of empowerment, notably as it exists in a ‘queer’ sphere providing a slight disconnect from the heterosexual aspect of sexual desire for personal satisfaction. As a consensus in modernity, “the nude body is perceived as a taboo in Western culture.” However, it is important to understand that Laura Mulvey’s theory of the Male Gaze (Mulvey, 2013) is present in the representation of the female caged body in this music video. The garment feeds into the idea that eroticism through visual imaging has an aspect of commodity fetishism and informed by the economic logic of post-modern culture (Gamman et al., 1995, pg. 183). Barktly argues that the female body is controlled by a “disciplinary regime of femininity” (Mcnay, 1992, pg. 33) when reflecting on Foucaults treatment of the body. Within this ‘regime’, techniques of disciplining the female body are also inscribed by restricted or hesitant body movement. Here, the model walks with an impeded step. Using Maurice Merleau-Ponty's reflections on objects and how they “cannot be understood independently of the subject’s practical interaction with them” (Mcnay, 1992; Rocamora and Smelik, 2019) the signified sign is one of restriction and submission. Merleau-Ponty typically characterizes the body in terms of silence in somatic philosophy (Carman and Boris, 2005, pg. 151), the “effective” weakness of the body is essential to its productive functioning – here the characters personality emerges once the clothing has been inhabited by the body challenging the clear-cut distinction between dress and undress. Monty provides a counter to objectification of the body as a reduction to its outward appearance. As a relationship between garment and movement, could this juxtaposition between freedom and cohesive force be a postmodernist attitude toward female body politics? Arguably, yes – for a postmodern aesthetic is to provide “superficial appearances that negotiate the seriousness of reality” (Rocamora and Smelik, 2019, pg.217). In the context of her surroundings, the background is plain and dull, almost void like allowing her to exist in an environment of absences. As Loirot writes in Jean Paul Gaultier: JPG A-Z, “when [the corset] is diverted from its original function, the corset becomes a symbol of power and sexual liberation.” (Jean-Paul Gaultier and Thierry-Maxime Loriot, 2022). Here, the garment provides a shift from the modernist order of production and utility to the post-modern order of seduction in a void of structured context and connection.
Throughout the video, there are two models, one male presenting and one female presenting, that are heavily adorned (see figure 3), mostly in the form of beaded and gold jewelry, consisting of necklaces, bracelets and earrings but also with head pieces and makeup. One could frame these presentations as that of a subcultural body – defined as a style existing “as symbolic representations of the subcultures ideology manifested in its material and visual cultures.” (Winge, 2012, pg. 11). Full of underlining's, gender and sexuality are deployed as categories that define cultural anxieties. In context, the 1980s materials for jewellery became “industrial and artificial; and truly novel. [ ... } Clothes were often combined with eccentric and provocative, unpredictable and irreverent accessories” (Deanna Farneti Cera, 2019, pg. 35) which truly encompasses the postmodern attitude being designed by Mr. Gaultier. Where the idea for these specific accessories can’t be specifically tracked, notes in “The Fashion Book” tell us that “Gaultier has taken inspiration from a variety of influences, from traditional ethnic textiles and techniques of historic costume,” (Kinneberg and Gardner, 2016). One could argue that this use of beading and references to different ethnicities and cultures is appropriation and instantly politicizes the model's body, blurring the boundaries between high art and mass culture (Gamman et al., 1995, pg. 216). As argued in Body Style, “the body does not simply function as something on which to drape clothing or to carry accessories; the body is integral to dress and non-verbal communication.” (Winge, 2012, pg.15). However, Gaultier says that his “clothes are, in a way, the best passport to make my ideas travel” (Jean-Paul Gaultier and Thierry-Maxime Loriot, 2022), in the context of globalization and the practice of postmodern amalgamation of different cultures and beings - “the clashing narratives are argued by Gaultier to simply reflect what he saw on the street – the postmodern collage of a globalized city such as Paris.” (Moss, 2018). Using Derrida’s theory of deconstruction, it could be said that this is the epitome of post-modernism as “signs are only meaningful in their relation to other signs.” (Pena, 2005). The allegory of jewellery as ‘fashion’ opens up possibilities to interpret `(instead of decoding) allowing them to exist in polysemy. Here, the signs value is destroyed as there is no presence where the element may be said to be meaningful. In other words, as the jewellery is existent in this vacuum of a setting that the characters are based in, the link to that which is not present destroys a discernible meaning to the object. There is still communication through accessories, it is just communication to the individual relation to it as a non-specific object resulting in a shared meaning in a collage of absences.
At end of the video, we are introduced to a character wearing a tight mesh turtleneck crop top with matching gloves, a fedora and acid wash mom-jeans (See Figure 4). His body is presented as toned and hyper-masculine. Towards the late 1960s, as an act of rejection towards the effeminate appearance stereotypical presented by gay men, an adoption of ‘machoism’ into male queer fashion presented itself as a way to dissociate from the ridiculed ‘unmanly’ cliches connotated with being gay. These became known as ‘Clones’ (Cole, 2000, pg. 94). Typically, ‘Clones’ “wore their garments in a self-consciously tight manner in order to enhance their physical attractiveness”. Gregg Blanchford reflects that the meaning of this styling was to define clothing with a new sense of eroticism and overt sexuality (Cole, 2000, pg. 95). Here, I will propose that Gaultier presents to us a ‘post-clone’ and can study this adaptation through Judith Butlers reflections on heteronormativity within fashion by questioning how identities are formed and “stylized into existence within predominant structures of culture and power” (Rocamora and Smelik, 2019, pg. 286). As the 1980s saw the extreme effects of the AIDS crisis (HIV.gov, n.d.), many young gay men had seen the traditional ‘clone’ as an outdated way of expressing their sexuality (Cole, 2000, pg. 169). The outdated image pushed them to "look to subcultural images as a way of asserting their masculinity” such as the ‘rockabilly’ and ‘skinheads’ especially within the London queer club scene. This styling of the queer scene is the epitome of postmodern. It collages hyper masculinity, deconstructing it to exist with different motivations but reconstructs it depending on the individual vision of presentation and purpose – an ‘eighties dandy’ that has adopted coexisting styles and clothing in “order to redefine himself as rehabilitated for contemporary times” (Maria Luisa Frisa and Stefano Tonchi, 2004). ‘Post-clones’ is a form of the ‘post-body’ where “styles coexist and clothing is an outcome of reflection” (Maria Luisa Frisa and Stefano Tonchi, 2004). The fragments of the past, but also recent, present and future are enacted through Gaultier’s fashion. As Butler argues that “whatever we call fashion is defined in dynamic power relations shaped by material and social contingencies.” (Rocamora and Smelik, 2019, pg. 295), therefore, in the vidoe “How to do that”, the ‘post-clone’ is a new presentation of sexuality through the amalgamation of music, dance and fashion communicating all within the context of absence.
In conclusion, Jean Paul Gaultier's music video for "Aow Tou dou Zat (How to do that)" serves as a quintessential example of postmodern fashion, intertwining music, dance and fashion all with camp sensibilities. Through a lens of Aesthetic Postmodernism, the video transcends the tradition of modernist signification, embracing a self-referential orientation that blurs the distinction between material goods and symbolic meaning. The use of the caged dress on the female model challenges notions of restriction and empowerment, while the adorned models reflect a subcultural body defined by cultural anxieties. Gaultier's innovative approach to fashion allows us to deconstruct and reconstruct his presentations in relation to the individual. This multifaceted exploration underscores fashion's capacity to challenge conventions and shape cultural narratives in the postmodern landscape.
Link to music video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCe-5xtPRFY