The metaphor of the prosthesis is often used to highlight the importance of garments. During a pandemic, however, it takes on a whole new dimension. At the beginning of 2020, the face mask was still a social phenomenon largely confined to the Asian region following previous outbreaks of SARS. But as the COVID-19 pandemic took hold, the face veiled by a mask became the global image par excellence for an extension of the human body whose main function was to provide protection from a (hidden) peril. It didn’t take long for the fashion industry to spot the potential of this new “accessory” and start selling ornately decorated face coverings. Originally introduced as a medical utensil, the face mask underwent a somnambulistic metamorphosis into a fashion item that no longer had a solely practical purpose, but was now intended to satisfy an aesthetic need among its wearers.
This brief excursion into our present time marked (or rather plagued) by COVID-19 demonstrates the extent to which a small piece of cloth has not only changed our appearance dramatically, macabrely merging us in this crisis into an ornamental mass, but also radically transformed our entire appearance such that we increasingly resemble sinister mannequins without visible facial expressions. Even in a grave pandemic, the longing to express individuality via our appearance remains a deep-seated human need.
However, Maria Visser’s works (fortunately) don’t concern the side-effects of the pandemic; instead, they deal with clothing in the broadest sense and its diverse manifestations. Starting out in painting, Visser began taking an artistic approach to clothing and its cultural molding as fashion early on in her studies, using the very same media that are usually associated with the fashion sector. A fitting example is the magazine Chic, devised and founded by her when she was still a student, and whose visual language and format refer to the world-famous Vogue. For her current exhibition Future in Store, Visser is now producing the third issue of Chic. Like the exhibition title, it examines the phrase “What has the future in store for me?”, a common expression in the English-speaking world. The word “store” is deliberately ambiguous, alluding on the one hand to the common retail term “in store” and on the other to the uncertainty of the future.
The shorter form Future in Store ambivalently alludes to a central psychological message of clothing and fashion which, produced by manufacturers in seasonal collections, always represents a symbol and a fixed point in the future for their fashion-savvy customers. The importance of the spatial presentation of fashion can’t be overstated, the cruise shows staged in extravagant villas where mid-season collections are exclusively displayed to affluent customers having become common practice for major fashion houses. This architectural aspect of presentation is artistically addressed by Visser in several ways, such as by creating architectural miniatures at the beginning of each new work and so, as it were, enabling the spatial presentation to take place as a parallel process of her collections. One of these miniature models entitled “Space Stores Condensed Time” shows how space nestles around each work like a cocoon.
The inclusion of architecture plays a key role in Visser’s artwork in that the creation of her own collections and their presentation by means of a “défilé” is an essential part of her oeuvre. However, what used to take place as a performance in pre-pandemic times must now be carried out by means of digital tools. Her specially designed fashion and jewelry collections “Future – X”, “Facades” and “Comb Through Gills” are presented by models in front of a green screen and then transferred to the miniature model. The already cool aesthetics of her futuristic-looking works are artificially heightened by digital production. Regarding the “Future – X” Collection, the vividness of the models is especially clear.
When designing her objects, Visser makes use of cryptic text semiotics that don’t simply subordinate themselves decoratively to the human silhouette, but claim an aesthetic autonomy and interpret the wearer as a physical extension of traditional presentation possibilities. The wearer of the often bulky-looking objects experiences a sculptural quality that, combined with the enigmatic nature of the semiotic systems used, underlines the ephemeral avant-garde idea all the more strongly. By wearing a certain “image,” the person comes to symbolize a diffuse idea of the future. A parallel can be seen with Ferdinand de Saussure’s semiotics: by adding prostheses or fashion objects, the human being becomes a signifier of a mental image of the future that’s never fixed and instead is always in a permanent state of emergence.
Maria Visser’s art is characterized by a complexity operating on the boundary between sculpture, performance, installation, and publication. It astutely reveals the mechanisms of the fashion world without being judgmental. Using various forms of expression, she playfully fuses her own interpretations of well-known fashion aesthetic codes and thus penetrates to the core of the fashion world which, revealed as a highly complex terrain, unites deep human longings in its supposed superficiality, and whose social significance can’t be overestimated.
– from CHIC issue 3, Future in Store (2021)