MUSEUM COLLECTIONS AS SUPPORT FOR RESEARCH ON DRESS AND FASHION: THE CASE JAMES LAVER. Fausto Viana (Escola de Comunicações e Artes/ Universidade de São Paulo) Abstract: James Laver (1999-1975) was one of the main researchers in fashion and costumes in the 20 th Century. He was the author of over one hundred publications, including papers, articles and books on varied subjects, and among those Costume and fashion, from 1969, is still one the most used books in fashion schools. The main aim of this article is to point out the importance of his iconographic sources. Key words: fashion; museum; Laver, James; costumes. 1. James Laver - fundamental bibliographical notes. James Laver was born in 1899, in Liverpool, in the United Kingdom. He was an orphan and raised by his religious father, and that caused him deep influence. He studied in the Liverpool Institute and stated that poetry was his favorite subject. He was 19 when he joined the army, but did not fight. The time was enough, though, for him to learn a lot on gambling, drinking and prostitution. Above all, he noticed how atheistic his colleagues were (LAVER, 1963, p.39). In 1919, he went to the University of Oxford, where he took modern history and theology, with a thesis on John Wesley. He engaged actively on the student s magazine Isis and won the Newdigate prize for his poem on Cervantes. In 1922, there was a contest for administrative sections of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. Laver was hired with two other young fellows. That job would only end in 1959 - thirty seven years later. 2. Laver and the job at the Victoria and Albert Museum The work of Laver would happen in the Department of Engraving, Illustration and Design. His boss in that period was Martin Hardie (1875-1952), a very distinguished engraver and painter. He was - like I was going to be later on, Laver said (1963:86) the keeper not only of the section of engravings but also painting, that included an immense number of watercolors and probably the best collection of miniatures of the world. (Idem) The prerequisites for that position were many for a 24 year-old youth.
There were six weeks of a severe adapting test, and maybe I should add, a bluff. Because Martin Hardie was only waiting for me to arrive to leave on vacation, and as soon as I was installed, there he left and told me to swim or sink. That was probably the best thing he could have done for me. (Idem, p. 87) engraving: He said that he should already have had previous knowledge of the different types of [...] it was necessary to know about the drawings of the Old Masters, posters, card games, fashion drawings, labels of commercial packages, Persian miniatures, Japanese engravings and every design type from architecture to embroidered vests. To have detailed knowledge on all this was simply impossible. To learn something on everything and everything of something was the best that I could do; and that is what I did. (Idem, p. 86) The work with Hardie was not the only element that helped make him famous - the work in the Victoria and Albertgot him in touch with collectors and riches of several categories. Under the auspices of the Museum, he travelled all over Europe, negotiating acquisitions for the collections. When I went back to the Museum, Laver said, soon it was clear for me that many of the connnoiseurs and collectors were a little crazy. I reached the reluctant conclusion that collecting, by itself, it is a pathological activity. One of the most surprising cases described by him was the one of a collector of engravings that had twenty thousand pieces. He couldn t notice what it meant to own twenty thousand drawings. If that man spent all of his free time looking at the drawings, it would take him years until he could look at all of them individually. (Idem, p.104) It was the work in that session of the museum that got him interested in fashion. It was to his surprise that he became an expert in fashion after publishing Taste and fashion, released little before the War (idem, p.239). My main objective with the study of fashion had one main purpose, he said, a technical and utilitarian purpose. I wanted to date pictures, he explained (idem). He created a file with dates and information that could help him date the paintings and drawings. But when that job was done, many other questions popped up: I found myself led irresistibly into some curious avenues of speculation. Having studied the What and the When, I began to wonder about the How and the Why. I am still wondering, but I began to evoke certain theories... (Idem, p.240) 3. Laver and his theoretical references The theme of this article is the importance of James Laver's iconographical material. However, in the work of Laver no picture, painting, sculpture or image is presented without a
theoretical context. The theoretical reflection on costume is based on ideas and iconographical observation. And the demonstration of how certain clothes appeared historically. In that sense, it is important to highlight that James Laver works with a wide spectrum of authors that approach the topics costume and fashion in their works. But there are two that deserve prominence for the importance that they had in the development of the work of Laver. The first is C. W. Cunnington (1878-1961), a doctor that together with his wife Phillis, also a doctor, created an important collection and became historians of costumes. Their work was based on the analysis of the object, according to Taylor (TAYLOR, 2004, p.51). Together, he and the wife wrote several books on English costume. Taylor affirms that both Laver and Cunning ton took deep interest in issues of women, style, sexuality and fashion, building in their own ways on Flügel's ideas (Idem, p.51). Flügel was Professor J. C. Flügel (1874-1955), from the University of London and the author of The psychology of costumes. Flügel and Laver presented a TV show together, in dialog shape, and Laver stated that He was one of the few professional psychologists to turn his attention to what is surely a most important department of psychology. His book on dress is a classic, and he was, so far as I know, the first to propound the theory of the shifting erogenous zone. According to this theory the naked body has little or no erotic appeal; but if a part of it is, so to speak, shut off, it acquires erotic capital, and it then becomes possible to draw attention to it with effective results. When the body of woman is thus divided into zones, the function of the dress designers is to emphasize them one after the other and this shifting of emphasis is what we know as fashion. (LAVER, 1963, p. 242) 4. Laver and his iconographical references Laver analyses in his book Costume through the ages, in a very simplified manner, that documentation is the key to understanding the past. The Greeks knew that the Persian Kings were clad in garments that gleamed with gold; the Romans were aware that the barbarian tribes on the outskirts of the Empire wore trousers. Trousers were indeed the mark of the barbarians. The Byzantine emperors had only too much reason to know that the invading Turks wore turbans. (LAVER, 1961, p.5) Laver suggests that the most reliable documentation dates back to the first century of our era (I Century D.C). Most painting of that period has disappeared, he says, but
Much sculpture has survived, and from statues, busts, bas-reliefs and the like it is possible to know with a considerable degree of accuracy what was worn by both sexes in the Roman world, at least so far as the upper classes were concerned. [...] We know what the Roman emperors looked like as well as the empress, leading senators and fashionable women. The change in hairstyles of the first and second centuries, for example, can be followed in meticulous detail. (Idem, p.6) Laver will use the collections in museums and private collectors: the Vatican, the Louvre, the National Museum of Naples, institutions in Pompeii and in many other places. The portraits of Justin and Theodora, Byzantine Emperors analyzed by Laver, are portrayed in mosaics in Ravenna and date back to Century 6 th d. C. Between the 9 th and 11 th centuries he mentions only a few illuminati documents and sculpted tombs. For the clothes of the 12 th century, he searches for the cathedrals and the Gothic sculptures as a true encyclopedia of contemporary clothes of the Medium Ages. (Idem) The material of the 14 Century is more abundant: there are more manuscripts that allow understanding their colors and their shapes. There are sculptured figures and monuments, and they normally tell the date they were produced. Dating, according to Laver, is particularly important, because it is in the second half of the fourteenth century that there emerges something which we can recognize as fashion (idem, p.7) From then on, paintings, drawings and engravings turn out to be the main documental references (see Images 1 and 2). But with the French Revolution and the democratization of the fashion, and even in Louis XIV times (1754-1793), engravers began to publish engravings in which the dresses of the ladies start to appear. The dolls of fashion, the Pandoras, appeared and could be taken to the noble ladies, so that they could choose their models. It was, anyway, a rather clumsy way to popularize fashion, and it involved a time delay. It was impossible for a woman in distant countries, or even distant provinces, to be fashionable. (Idem)
Img.1- A drawing by Leonardo da Vinci, belonging to Windsor Castle. Laver used it in his book Drama, its costume and decor. Souce: LAVER, 1951, p. 46. Img. 2- Washings the ruffs, engraving by Crispin van der Passe (1564-1637). It was used by Laver in his book Clothes. Source: LAVER, 1952, p.65. Laver states that most of his iconographical sources were the fashion plates (see Images 3 and 4). They were not expensive and were easily transportable. They were issued in regular
sequence and in enormous numbers. Henceforward, it is possible to trace fashion s changes year by year (LAVER, 1961, p.9) Another source used by Laver were the fashion books that started to appear in the 19th Century and that could not be reproduced in a large number, due to lack of technical skills in large scales. But he is very clear when judging the works: A costume history is nothing without pictures, and these were for the most part provided by lithography or wood engraving, the color being laboriously added by hand (idem, 1961, p. 9), what certainly diminished quality. Image 3- Engraving from the journal La belle Assemblée, from 1817. It was used by Laver in his book Fashion and fashion Plates 1800-1900. Source: LAVER, 1943, plate 2. Image 4- Drawing inspired by the fashion plates, depicting costumes from 1818 to 1821. Source: LAVER, 1961, p.82.
Other references include pattern making books, like the one in Image 5. He would also use this kind of material when engaged as a consultant in movie production. He never acted as a costume designer. Image 5- Cavalry pattern from the book Military Taylor s Pattern Book (circa 1800). Source: LAVER, 1948, plate 6. Image 6- Mary Bagot, the Countess of Falmouth. Source: LAVER, 1942, plate 11. Painting and portraits, individual or collective, are represented all the time in Laver s work and show his very specific viewpoints of fashion. It is the case of Image 6, a historical portrait of the Countess of Falmouth (1645-1679), circa 1645. The piece is in the book The ladies of Hampton Court, from 1942. Laver was a very connected man to his time and photography wouldn t take long t be part of his publications. One good example of that is Image 7, from of the latest books written by Laver: Modesty in dress, from 1969. He compared this costume with the one on image 8, analyzing the female social and cultural context and the material used in the costumes, in the past and present.
Image 7- Costume to ride a bicycle cycle, 1952. Source: LAVER, 1969, p. 148. Image 8- Costume for bicycle riding, 1969. Source: LAVER, 1969, p. 147. 5. Final remarks Image 9- James Laver, in 1965, at the age of 66. Source: LAVER, 1965, p.2. One might always wonder, when holding in hands one of those manuals of the 19th century that depict costumes from all over the world at different ages: how could this author do it? It was an age with no Internet, no fast mailing, no proper transportation system Taylor explains, for instance, that August Racinet, the author of Le costume historique, from 1888, used very badly recommended material about costumes of Turkey, for example. They were fantasized versions, a highly romanticized version of the costumes of Turkey and the European East. (TAYLOR, 2004, p. 21) is nothing without images, Said Laver, as we have seen
(LAVER, 1961, p. 9). However, introducing an image without giving precise information about her- even to question its authenticity- is totally null when it comes to researching costumes. Et quel est votre métier, Monsiuer? Je suis conservatéur de musée. (LAVER, 1963, p.149) Laver would become one of the two most important researchers in the popularization of fashion studies in the 20th century, especially through his book Taste and Fashion. The other was François Boucher (1885-1966), keeper of the Carnavalet Museum in Paris, and the author of The History of Costume in the West. It was precisely the intense care for information that made these studies so respected in a field that once had been considered futile. Laver, that as we have seen started his costume studies because of his job - conservateur de musée at the Victoria and Albert Museum, created many theories, but there are two that are still studied and respected. The first states that: In fact, there is a list we could follow. The same costume will be : Indecent / 10 years before its time; Shameless / 5 years before its time; Outré (Daring) / 1 year before its time; Smart / 'Current Fashion'; Dowdy / 1 year after its time; Hideous / 10 years after its time; Ridiculous / 20 years after its time; Amusing / 30 years after its time; Quaint / 50 years after its time; Charming / 70 years after its time; Romantic /100 years after its time; Beautiful / 150 years after its time. (LAVER, 1937, cap.18) The other establishes that costumes follow three main principles in their creation: Hierarchical Principle = dressing to indicate one's position in society Utility Principle = dressing for warmth and comfort Seduction Principle = dressing to attract the opposite sex. These principles were based on Flügel s and naturally need to be updated, especially because of the diversity of genre, the inclusion of women in the working market and social political changes from 1930 on. What is most important for one to notice is that all the images used in this paper so far, except Image 9, belong to museum s collections. These institutions were visited by Laver or even directed by him. These images are fundamental to the study of fashion and costume, and belong to French, English and other museums.
As stated Susan Sontag, the interpretation of a piece is not of absolute value. The evaluation in itself needs to be evaluated, within a scope of human historical conscience (FERNIE, 2011, p. 218), she says, pointing out that the work of a man like James Laver will always be worth double checking, as well as all the museum pieces he made use of. And that is why having the patrimony is essential. 6. References FERNIE, Eric (org.). Art history and its methods. Londres: Phaidon Press, 2011. FLÜGEL, J. C. A psicologia das roupas. São Paulo: Editora Mestre Jou, 1965. LAVER, James. British Military Uniforms. Londres: Penguin Books, 1948.. Clothes. Londres: Burke, 1952.. Costume through the ages. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1961.. Drama- its costume and décor. Londres: The Studio Ltd, 1951.. Fashion and fashion plates. Londres: The King Penguin Books, 1943.. Modesty in dress. Londres: Heinemann, 1969.. Museum piece or the education of an iconographer. Londres: A. Deutsch, 1963.. Taste and fashion. Edição Kindle, 1937, capítulo 18.). The ladies of Hampton Court. Londres: William Collins, 1942. TAYLOR, Lou. Establishing dress history. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2004.. The study of dress history. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2002.