Exploring the many creations under the keywords “Digital Fashion” currently presented on the internet, one quickly finds a common and peculiar reoccurring phenomenon. Virtual clothings flows through digital space, draping, behaving and moving in a way that suggests the presence of a body underneath the clothing. But there is no body depicted in the renderings. The world of digital fashion, it seems, is on its way to becoming a world without bodies. This has both interesting implications for the future, but also prompts examinations of the past of fashion design. The invisible walk cycles of digital fashion unintentionally provoke a discussion of one of fashion history’s most interesting tensions – the clothed body.
Bodies are a subject which has naturally been present throughout the history of fashion. Over the course of its evolution, the fashion industry has treated and impacted bodies in a multitude of ways. There have been phases of fashion history in which the body was the leading force, fashion designers aimed to flatter the body, respect its qualities and varieties and find a way to make garments that interplay with the body. The body was a part of the fashion system which could not be ignored or neglected. Similarly, fashion has also gone through phases of extreme body negation, attempting to fight against the natural qualities of the human body, forcing it into unnatural shapes. Especially in women’s fashion, the relation between garment and body has been a constant point of contention which in recent times, has arguably reached its peak. Despite the modern movements for body acceptance and inclusivity, fashion remains a space in which bodies are a constant source of conflict.
It seems ironic, therefore, that in digital fashion, the body appears to lose its significance altogether. Garments can float through digital space without physical limitations. On one hand, this could be viewed as a bizarre but logical consequence of current efforts towards inclusivity and diversity. If the body is invisible, there is no need to worry about skin colour, size, age and physical condition. The body becomes merely a suggestion of form, a sort of draping guide for digital garments that escapes all the pitfalls that depicting a true to life figure would bring with it.
On the other hand, this complete negation of the body suggests that in fashion, no semblance of a real physical body is “good enough” to do justice to the garment. The body is an obsolete instrument of fashion, a tool that the modern fashion aesthetic has finally managed to evolve away from. Either way of viewing this development towards invisible bodies in digital fashion brings with it a myriad of questions and discussion points that could be elaborated on in their own essays. Further developments of this trend will show if it is here to stay, or if visible bodies, no matter in which shape will make a return to digital fashion in the end.
Further reading:
Ana Neto & João Ferreira (2023) Lasting Bonds: Understanding Wearer-Clothing Relationships through Interpersonal Love-Theory, Fashion Theory, 27:5, 677-707, DOI: 10.1080/1362704X.2023.2170706
Emma McClendon (2019) The Body: Fashion and Physique—A Curatorial Discussion, Fashion Theory, 23:2, 147-165, DOI: 10.1080/1362704X.2019.1567057
Lucia Ruggerone (2017) The Feeling of Being Dressed: Affect Studies and the Clothed Body, Fashion Theory, 21:5, 573-593, DOI: 10.1080/1362704X.2016.1253302
