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Essay

Essay: Between Man And Child

by Lou Stoppard on 21 April 2016

Featuring work by JW Anderson and Walter Van Beirendonck, this section of Mad About The Boy explored the way fashion toys with the line between man and child.

Featuring work by JW Anderson and Walter Van Beirendonck, this section of Mad About The Boy explored the way fashion toys with the line between man and child.

Installation shot from Mad About The Boy

For the March 1985 cover of the The Face stylist Ray Petri recruited a thirteen-year-old boy, Felix Howard, to model a hat emblazoned with the word 'Killer', a reference to Jamaican slang. Howard stares firmly into the camera; his rounded cheeks are obviously those of a child, but he has the swagger of a grown man. Later, members of the eighties Buffalo movement revealed he was chosen because he “had the face of an elder person”. Thus, the image toys with the line between man and boy.

While most see the end of boyhood being tied to physical changes, fashion designers and image-makers have played with the real meaning of growing up; they pin abstract concepts to boyhood – freedom, insolence, irreverence – and similarly intangible ideals to manhood – strength, poise, resilience. Depictions of the man as boy and boy as man can move beyond subversion into fetish. Childlike emblems, from fairytale details to cartoons, are placed on otherwise adult attire, which can sexualise the wearer. These are regular themes in the work of Walter Van Beirendonck. The image shown here of his Autumn/Winter 1986 Bad Baby Boys collection, by Patrick Robyn, shows this interest in contrasts – the serious persona of the adult model is undermined by the ribbons, pompoms and teddy bear. Similar bear motifs appeared in the Autumn/Winter 2015 collection of London knitwear label Sibling – whose collections tend to explore masculinity through groupings, gangs, factions and clubs – and the Spring/Summer 2013 collection of J. W. Anderson.

Fashion photography is full of examples of the confident, coquettish man-child. We see youth that is aware of the power of youth.

Fashion photography is full of examples of the confident, coquettish man-child. We see youth that is aware of the power of youth. When a fifteen-year-old Brooklyn Beckham appeared on the cover of Man About Town magazine’s Spring/Summer 2014 issue, the strapline read 'Drop The Boy'. Yet, while we are encouraged to view him as a newly mature handsome male, the images revel in childlike norms: he appears as if in a bedroom and plays with the classic teen prop, a PlayStation. He is attractive because of his inexperience – a man because of his boyishness.

Objects featured in this section of the Mad About The Boy exhibition:

  • Tyrone Lebon, A Rush And A Push, Arena Homme+, September 2014. Courtesy of Tyrone Lebon.
  • J. W. Anderson, Spring/Summer 2013. Courtesy of J. W. Anderson.
  • Sibling, Autumn/Winter 2015. Courtesy of Sibling.
  • Patrick Robyn, Bad Baby Boys, Walter Van Beirendonck, Autumn/Winter 1986. Courtesy of Patrick Robyn.
  • Mitzi Lorenz and Jamie Morgan, Buffalo: Ray Petri, 2000. Courtesy of Ligaya Salazar.
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