ECN 302 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

ECN 302 - Essay Example Over half of the Americans have a contrary view and claim that all the government intervention achieves is causing more damage than benefits, while six percent believe that it had no effect and 17% were found to be unsure (Fox, 2012). In a contemporary era, whereby auto bailouts, maximum debt and Dodd-Frank reform, interventions by the government, seem to be the Obama administration’s solution option, according to the article. The article claims that this stand has created a deep partisan gap between supporters and the opposition of the viewpoint. It highlights that the proposition is gains support mostly from democrats while most republicans and independents oppose the approach. It further explains that more divisions resulted due to class differences, as the wealth class claimed that economy management by the government was helpful while the middle class respondents believed that government control destroyed the economy (Fox, 2012). The model states that the economy will be boosted when the governments spends enormous sums of borrowed funds. The article highlights these as it highlights how the $787 stimulus package involves federal tax reductions and expenditures on infrastructure and other government projects. These will help to address the recession crisis. The model is used to address the sluggish US economy more with the current

We need to respect each other Essay Example for Free

We need to respect each other Essay As-Salamu `Alaykum: This type of greeting is common in the Arab Muslim countries meaning Peace be upon you. This greeting indicates that every person should ask for the well being of others. Respecting each other’s independence, rights and wishing for the well being of others is an integral humanity feature which should exist in every single individual who call himself/herself Human. Bible also says, †Do to others what you want others to do to you. † Thus in almost every religion respecting others emotions, belief, self respect is a must directive. But is that really happening or we just use religion to harm others than safeguarding interest of humanity. The Present day scenario: Today, the world is more like a small village wherein every single person is able to connect himself/herself with the rest of the world. There is freedom of speech and expression in almost all the countries of the world. The standard of living has improved in many countries. But a big problem has also cropped up in this new advanced world. And this new problem is of jealousy. Today no nation wants to be called backward in any field. Every country is trying hard to make more military arrangements than the neighbor. Steps are taken to prove supremacy in trade. Even the sovereignty of other country is also kept on stake just to prove power status of the country. The eastern people in wake of progress adopt culture of the western countries and there by displacing there past ethical values and moral. At once, multiculturalism and the banner of tolerance commands a trivialization of values, while sustainability of tradition seems to ever more hinge on its profitability – where value replaces virtue. This philosophy often rides the coattails of modernization, of westernization. In the race for success and progress we almost forgot to respect each other’s culture, sovereignty, equality and self-respect. Let’s just have an idea of the changes happening in the world and the possible ways of improving our attitudes towards them. East and West. 2. Cultural changes and respect of culture: Culture is infamously difficult to define, harder thus to then preserve. As the habits, lives, and histories of the over 6 billion individuals on our planet entwine. Cultural changes have been dominant in the eastern countries like Japan, China, India, Thailand, Malaysia etc. At these places, people are trying to copy all the ways of living of the western people. Reason being that they believe that by copying such ways they will be called people with class and their country will be identified as developed nation. Anthropologists are always pressed to provide concrete examples, and tangible evidence of their efforts. Highlighting cultural threats or extinction is not as black and white as a corporate bottom line, nor Compared to the West, can we in the GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) be considered more collective than individualistic. There are advantages and disadvantages to both. Collectivism can lead to heard mentality and a sense of confinement. Individualism can put the success of one at the expense of another or many, and an ultimate alienation of self. Respect of culture is must and need to be recognized as an asset of our forefather’s. These people do not know that the western people are trying to copy the eastern culture as they find eastern culture to be more ethical based and sole soothing. People in western countries are copying the clothing styles of China, marriage rituals of India etc. These people are trying to extract all the moral values from the eastern countries and give to their children whom they find separated from the family values. Risk to sovereignty and respect of sovereignty: Sovereignty means the independence of the country to make decisions of its own without the interference of any other country. Every country today is sovereign but literally. The present fact is that in the wake of proving its autonomy on the world politics, every developed nation is trying to risk other country’s sovereignty. In the field United States is at the top level. By attacking Afghanistan and Iraq in the last few years, the country proved its supremacy over the world politics. But along with that the risk to sovereignty of other countries has again reinstated the tensions of cold war. East and West. 3. The risk of possible Iran and United States war has increased. Reason being that United States do not want a nuclear state in the gulf region to maintain its control over the crude oil. Whereas Iran wants to protect its boundaries from the eyes of the United States resulting in increasing tension in the middle east. The territories of Pakistan are attacked with a view to kill terrorist but against the will of the government of that country. Further more United States is trying in making a deal with India on nuclear supply but on the terms of risking its sovereignty. Respecting each other’s boundary is a must thing but with an attitude like that United States is inviting more enemies from the eastern world. Risk on Equality and respect the idea of equality: Equality is the emphatic commitment to democracy is born of a commitment to equality. Thus every person in this democratic world enjoys equality before law, equality to enjoy fundamental rights etc. Still the equality discriminates in these countries especially in United States. For instance the seventeen-year-old seem fit for political participation than some of the voting population. Regardless, it is a degree of discrimination. Furthermore children address their elders and even parents by their first name in the democratic nation. This may be called equality but along with that it undermines the importance of relationships. Thus democracy in the United States goes far to promote equality though their system does discriminate against age. Conclusion: In the nutshell, we can conclude that independence and respect of each others sovereignty, culture, right to equality, status and power identification in the International affairs is an important factor that should be considered so as to bring about peace in the world.

Haunted, Joyce Carol Oats: Analysis

Haunted, Joyce Carol Oats: Analysis Haunted by Joyce Carol Oates is a great story about two young girls that are, like most young girls, very adventurous. It is a postmodernism story that was highly impacted by the, then new ideas of psychoanalysis. I like the way in this time period that everything isnt happy, its more realistic. Oates did a great job of creating a sense of fragmentation and isolation in this story. Melissa starts with some background, about how everything got started. Talking about how her mother told her ghosts werent real, but just superstition, and how it was unsafe to go tramping around these old abandoned houses. She then gets very jumpy, jumping from past to present. This sort of threw me off, but she accomplished the sense of fragmentation by doing this. She then goes on to say how stories begin with Once upon a time and how she couldnt tell her stories that way, because thats how fairy tales began. In the fifth grade, Melissa had a teacher, Mrs. Harding who was very picky about messy notebooks. More is expected of you, Melissa, so you disappoint me more is what Mrs. Harding would say to Melissa about her journal grade, making her feel isolated. And Mary Lou, her friend wouldnt help the situation any. Mrs. Harding died of a stroke, and Mary Lou blamed it on the two of them, that was because of us, wasnt it, also creating the sense of isolation. Melissa always thought Mary Lou was the prettiest girl, and that she was ugly, again making her feel isolated. Then she jumps back to present time. This part was hard for me to wrap my head around, I had to read the whole story a few times to understand what was going on, but when I did, I really liked it. She talks about how shes older, husband dead for nearly a year..children scattered, once again, isolated. But now it doesnt seem to bother her, she likes the way there is no one to interrupt..no one to pry. But she isnt content with the way she looks, being older, so she avoids mirrors, to make her feel younger. Then she jumps back in time, but not back to her childhood with Mary Lou, but with her husband. They were in a cornfield, and she was running from him, she began to hear the rustling sound, the sound of voices. She felt he could never love her, because she was the ugly one, comparing herself to Mary Lou, whom he had never met. Once again, making her feel isolated. Then back again to her childhood with Mary Lou. A story about the Medlocks, and their farm. Mr. Medlock died in one of the barns, and Mrs. Medlock found him, and how she went crazy and was put in a state hospital. Of course Melissa and Mary Lou wondered if the house or barns were haunted, and they just couldnt stay away. They explored the barns, and peeped in the house windows, and climbed on the roof. Mary Lou would make comments about how shed like to burn this place down, and Melissa would get scared that she really would, again feeling isolated, and Mary Lou would laugh and say she was just playing. Melissas mother hated Mary Lou and tried to get Melissa to make better friends with the other girls. When Mary Lou and Melissa would go to town, Mary Lou would ignore Melissa when the other girls were around, then act like her best friend on the ride home. Once again, Melissa is isolated. Melissa was very jealous of Mary Lous long, blond, silky hair. She would dream about it, but by t he time she woke up, she would be confused if the hair was hers, or someone elses. Mary Lou was older, taller, a bit heavier, and in Melissas eyes, prettier. Melissa noticed that the older boys whistled at her, and the bus driver called her Blondie, but Melissa never got that attention. Mary Lou would make comments about how she wished all the cows would die..so her father would give up and sell the farm and they could live in town in a nice house and to Melissa, Mary Lou wanted to abandon her. Again, Melissa was feeling isolated. Later Melissa found out that the bank owned most of Mary Lous familys farm, even the dairy cows. In seventh grade, Mary Lou had a boyfriend who was older, and she picked Hans over Melissa, leaving her walking on the road by herself. She said she preferred to be alone, so she was isolated, but this time, by choice. Around this time, Melissa and Mary Lou go to the Minton house, where a man beat his wife to death and no one found out until he killed himself with a .12-guage shotgun. From the road the house looked big, and it seemed hard to believe that anything like that happened, but Melissa was wrong. Inside the house, Melissa heard low persistent murmuring but Mary Lou didnt act like she heard it, once again Melissa is isolated. Hans had stopped coming around, Mary Lous father had found out about it, Mary Lou would say I hate them all, and I wish.. which Im sure she would have taken back if she knew what was to become of her. They picked the Minton farm as the one they liked the best, picnicking on the front porch, acting like sisters, acting like they lived there. Melissa went back herself a few days later, and thats when she went upstairs and the woman greeted her. She was alone, but wasnt afraid. When the person told her to come away from the window, she took her time. This really surprised me, but this is probably the first time in the whole story that she didnt really feel isolated, but I definitely would! The way Oates didnt use quotation marks on what the person said to Melissa, until Melissa saw the woman confused me. The woman punished her, she became scared, then let her go. This is where the psychoanalysis comes in. Is she dreaming this woman is there, and this punishment happened? Because she talks about how she doesnt mind the smell of the room, and how its not her doing these things (taking off her pants/panties and lying down on the nasty bed.) Melissa told Mary Lou about the Minton house, but not that the woman wanted to see her like the woman asked, and Mary Lou went anyway. I think this is the first time in the story where Melissa feels like shes in control when it comes to hers and Mary Lous friendship., but this is what costs her the friendship. Mary Lou makes the comment I hate you..I always have and yes, again, Melissa is isolated. Then back to present day, and Melissa is confused. She knows what has happened in her life, but not what has happened in the pages of the notebook. Mary Lou was found murdered ten days after her hateful comment to Melissa, and Im sure Melissa felt as if it was partly her fault. Her mother made sure she knew that Jesus loves her too, and her parents wouldnt let her to go the funeral. Im sure she felt isolated. She finishes up the story with how she doesnt remember things that just happened as well as things that happened in the past, and with Once upon a time. Oates did a really good job of writing this story. It was very believable, if it wasnt true. She did a good job of using psychoanalysis, and a constant feel of isolation. I liked it a lot, I liked most of the Modernism/Postmodernism stories.

Joan Of Arc Essay -- Essays Papers

Joan Of Arc Witchcraft is an on going concern throughout all ages in history. Many people believe in the power of darker forces. Most fear those with special gifts and begin to make accusations formulated through jealousy. Joan of Arc was one of those people that had many gifts and foresaw the future through divine intervention. Burned at the stake for being accused and tried as being a witch, she never gave up her pride or lost faith in her God. Joan was born in 1412 and lived in a small village called Domremy, which is located in the Champagne district of northeastern France. She grew up as the daughter of a farmer. Often working on the farm and tending to the animals, Joan lived the life of a peasant woman.1 She did not attend school and never learned to read or write. Even though she was illiterate she spent most of her time praying and attending church.2 At the age of thirteen she became aware of something she soon came to call "voices." Joan perceived these voices as being divine. Later on these voices Joan heard led her to reveal a secret outcome of a battle that only the king himself had knowledge of. After learning of Joan's prediction, the rightful king, Charles VII called her in to talk and Joan told him about her visions and prophecies.3 Meanwhile in France, the English began to gradually invade the central area. This was part of the One Hundred Years War, and the English threatened the city of Orleans. Orlean s is located eighty miles south of Paris and if the English would have captured the city, Paris would have probably been next.4 The only solution to this problem was to stop the English at Orleans. At age seventeen, Joan of Arc suited up for battle to lead her troops to Orleans and drive the French ... ... Press Ltd, 1996. 36. 16. Wheeler, Bonnie. Fresh Verdicts on Joan of Arc. New York: Gerland Publishing Inc., 1996. 58. 17. Michelet, Jules. Joan of Arc. New York: University of Michigan, 1957. 31. 18. Pernoud, 161. 19. Wheeler, 98. Bibliography - Beevers, John. Saint Joan of Arc. New York: Hanover House, 1959. - Lightbody, Charles. The Judgements of Joan. London: George Allen and Urwin Ltd., 1961 - Michelet, Jules. Joan of Arc. New York: University of Michigan, 1957. - Pernoud, Regine. Joan of Arc. New York: Stein and Day, 1966. - Warner, Marina. The Trial of Joan of Arc. Great Britain: Guernsey Press Ltd, 1996. - Wheeler, Bonnie. Fresh Verdicts on Joan of Arc. New York: Gerland Publishing Inc., 1996. - Winwar, Frances. The Saint and the Devil. New York: Harper and Brothers Publishers, 1948

Camp Bow Wow

Camp Bow Wow The three broad management skills used by Camp Bow Wow managers are conceptual skills, human skills, and technical skill. Both managers at Camp Bow Wow use all three management skills. They both use conceptual skills and try to figure out tough situations that are not manageable and turn it in to manageable and also make sure that their new hires are trained the right way by promoting and mentoring new staff.Both of managers also use human skills. The managers make sure they motivate their employees. Sue the owner of the camp expectations are that her customers are happy with everything they did and want them to know that they have done everything to make their customer happy with their. Both managers try to make sure that the customers are happy and also that do everything to make the dogs safe and happy as well.Sue the owner has her camp counselor’s do a bit of everything at Camp Bow Wow. She makes sure the counselors can balance the dogs, answering phones, book ing reservations and working the front desk properly. To keep Camp Bow wow efficiently the counselors and the managers make sure keep and follow a daily schedule plane for the dogs. This includes activities like grooming, outdoor exercise, food, baths, and medical support.The managers try to make sure to balance customer service as effective and efficient, by trying to satisfy their customers with their service and also try to get the job done without any grey spots, because it’s important to the counselors and managers that their customers know that the counselors care about their dogs. The counselors and the managers do not want their customers to think that they only care about their efficient at Camp Bow Wow.They want them to feel that it’s more than that and want the customers to come back in the future. Two activities that leaders at Camp Bow Wow perform daily are making sure that the Pooches get a lot of personal attention, they both managers make sure that the dogs are groomed right, that they get their outdoor exercise and also get the medical support they need. This is very important to them because they want their customers to be satisfied and that they care about the dogs and also come back in the future for more service.

Art in Fashion Essays

Art in Fashion Essays Art in Fashion Essay Art in Fashion Essay What is fashion? Is it art? Is it high art? In the world of fashion and art today, this is a contested question. Many art critics do not see fashion as an equal to the fine arts such as painting and sculpture. Critics have made remarks that fashion design should be â€Å"under the heading of vanity for its intent is of no inner value† (Miller 25-40). Edmund Burke and Immanuel Kant both said that fashion is a form of imitation. Burke held that it is a â€Å"kind of imitation that is from a social need of conformity†, while Kant says that it is a form of vanity (Miller 25-40). Sanda Miller, the author of Fashion as Art; Is Fashion Art? , states that â€Å"a work of art in the classificatory sense is 1. an artefact, 2. a set of the aspects of which has been conferred upon it the status of candidate for appreciation by some person or persons acting on behalf of a certain institution (the art world) (Miller 25-40). Marcel Duchamp used everyday objects as art in an unusual way. Noel Carroll asked questions such as â€Å"must all art emerge from a pre-existing network of social relations? Does it appear to be informative? Does it depend upon stretching the notions of social institutions, social practices, and social relationships beyond the breaking point? (Miller 25-40). Miller at one point states that the issue is one of intention versus function. â€Å"The study of clothes from a historical perspective is an even more recent endeavor and, therefore, it has not yet acquired a status equal to that of the fine arts; this may well have something to do with the perceived lower status of craft. Nevertheless, the historical study of clothes is inextricably linked to and dependent on that of visual art for a simple reason: their perishable nature† (Miller 25-40). â€Å"The entry of fashion exhibitions into high art settings where fashion is normally not displayed, such as Giorgio Armani designs at the Guggenheim, has caused much heated debate from art critics† (Palmer 121-126). â€Å"Fashion exhibitions and their reviews offer a bridge for crossing these perceived boundaries as they combine new scholarship with artifact study† (Palmer 121-126). Along with the catwalk show and the retail store, the museum has become an increasingly important site for fashion. In recent years, fashion exhibitions have been held for the first time at venues as different as the Guggenheim Museum, the Imperial War Museum, and the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Musee de la Mode, and the Victoria and Albert Museum. Some of these fashion exhibitions â€Å"have attracted up to 500,000 visitors and brought in millions of dollars of sponsorship money, as well as reams of publicity, not all of it positive† (Steele 7-30). Two fashion exhibitions in New York, for example, were described, respectively, as an egregious paid advertisement and a fawning trifle that resembles a fancy showroom (Steele 7-30). Partiality, distress and distrust still surround fashion within many museums. This sometimes â€Å"takes the form of fashion being tolerated as a form of entertainment which will pull the crowds, with no acknowledgment of the serious contribution it also makes to the educational role of the museum (Steele 7-30). To some extent, the hostility towards fashion in the museum, especially the art museum, â€Å"replicates the traditionally low status of fashion within academia, but it is also related to disagreements between academics and curators, as well as by conflicts about the role of the museum in contemporary society and about fashion as an aspect of popular culture† (Steele 7-30). Fashion finds similarities in known art forms. Compare architecture and fashion; Architecture reached an artistic status very early on, it did not have the sole role of being functional. It is questionable as to why fashion has not reached the same status that architecture has. Relate fashion and time-based work such as photography and film; one is a token and one is a type. One individual put forth the idea that a reason for the lack of seriousness attributed to fashion is that fashion has predominantly been a female art and society in the past was predominantly patriarchal. â€Å"Arguments against have ranged from the fickle nature of fashion and its impermanence to its functional nature, and so on The arguments for are to do with the visual loveliness of clothes, which cannot be disputed† (Miller 25-40). If one were to sit down and compare an art form such as traditional drawing and fashion design, they would surely find a high amount of similarities. Fashion design is very much about the details and the process involved in turning out the final product as well. Some details are used to distinguish things such as social class, like in the French Revolution. â€Å"When a fashion outfit includes a new detail, it is the detail that leads fashion into the future† (Black 499-510). Details in fashion can give the consumer a certain feeling, contributing to whether or not they see they item as in trend and whether or not to buy it. Fashion design begins its roots with a sketch. The sketch is more than just a random drawing. It is â€Å"the most critical step of the fashion-design process, as everythingfrom concept to constructiondepends on its ability to realistically convey an imagined vision† (Malafronte 46-59). It is a crucial part of the design process. Fashion designers should be and are now more commonly trained in the fundamentals of drawing as it is so crucial to succeeding in the competitive world of fashion. At Parson’s School of Design, for example, â€Å"students are trained in a similar fashion as fine artists, taking numerous drawing courses and regularly drawing from the live model† (Malafronte 46-59). That training is beneficial to a fashion designers ability to understand color and proper aspects of design. In fashion, â€Å"a sketch must not only be aesthetically pleasing but also proportionally accurate† (Malafronte 46-59). Fashion designer Chris Benz says, â€Å"Drawing is the major catalyst for my creative process. First, I start thinking about the season I am designing for and meld that idea with some inspiration I have at the timeif its fall, then I think about the fabrics, weight, and textures I am feeling for the silhouette. In my little Smythson sketchbook, I do sketches of ideas and thoughts that will be fleshed out later in the process† (Malafronte 46-59). Something puzzling to a large portion of the fashion industry is the fact that performance art is considered high art to the masses, while this is still contested for fashion. Countless museums have recently started displaying performance art. Part of what changed is that some visual artists have come to see performance as a natural extension of their overall artistic practice, which may also embrace painting, video and installations (Rush 331-341). Two examples of extreme performance artists are William Pope. L and Paul McCarthy. Both artists, in addition to Geoffrey Hendricks and Patty Chang, have had performances at the Sculpture Center in New York. The performances, categorized as extreme performance art, often include strange bodily actions. Patty Chang, for example, does not see her pieces as political acts, she sees them as sculptures. â€Å"Many performance artists incorporate costume into their work as yet another extension of media boundaries† (Rush 331-341). One particular artist, Claude Cahun, was doing performance art in the 1930s, however, the photos weren’t discovered to be performance art pieces until the 1990s. â€Å"Lesbian, Jew, lovers with her half-sister, the artist Suzanne Malherbe, self-portraitist, provocateur, Cahun made a career of photographing herself in costumes that allowed for multiple identities† (Rush 331-341). Claude Wampler created a performance piece that held the intention of toying with time. â€Å"Performance art, usually time-based, becomes timeless in the realm of cyberspace†¦Performance art, which some critics trace to the virulent gestures used by Jackson Pollock in making his paintings, has radically influenced all forms of contemporary art, from video art to conceptual art to multimedia installations. It has placed the person and the body of the artist center-stage, and allowed a sense of self-mocking and playfulness to infiltrate a field often bent on the rigors of form and function† (Rush 331-341). Performance pieces and fashion shows display an extraordinary amount of similarities. Fashion shows are in fact performances. According to The Greatest Show on Earth: A Look at Contemporary Fashion Shows and Their Relationship to Performance Art, there are multiple types of performances involved in fashion exhibitions. The first is a spectacle. There are four main components of the spectacle show that can be manipulated by the designer to great effect. These are the type of model, the location, the theme, and the finale. (Duggan 243-270) Spectacle fashion shows are more like a theatre performance without a solid plot; they still have the goal of marketing a product. Alexander McQueen and Gianni Versace were some of the first designers to shock the fashion world and the press with their unconventional methods of fashion performance and shows. Spectacles also focus more on themes than the average fashion show. A theme can be very abstracted or it can be blatant, lending to the overall environment of the show. Spectacles also focus very much on the finales of the shows. The finales are generally supposed to shock the audience or make a memorable impression in some way. The spectacle shows place the designers in a combination celebrity and artist status. They develop a reputation through their performance pieces. (Duggan 243-270). Next is substance shows. The next subject the article addresses is science fashion. Science fashion focuses on the materials and construction of the garments, as well as the technology behind making the fashion. The incorporation of process in science designers shows and techniques reflects the importance of experimentation (Duggan 243-270). Watanabe and Miyake are two predominant science designers. Miyake searches for new interpretations of fabric and ways to transform the construction. As a result, he has earned a name in the art world. (Duggan 243-270). Structure design, the next type of fashion show, focuses on just that: the structure of the clothing. The shows are seen as a necessary evil and are as basic as possible so as not to take attention away from the construction of the actual garments. The structure designer finds three-dimensional form to be most representative of ideas (Duggan 243-270). Margiela and Rei Kawakubo are the discussed structure designers. Margielas patrons consider their purchases to be more akin to art collecting than to shopping sprees (Duggan 243-270). Not only do these designers focus on structure and construction, they also focus on deconstruction in certain cases. The final design type is statement. Statement designers create environments and presentations that reflect confrontational ideas and messages (Duggan 243-270). A large emphasis is placed on how the clothes are perceived. Some statement designers are Susan Cianciolo, Miguel Adrover and Elena Bajo. Often times, statement design shows are controversial and incorporate aspects or even garments of other more mainstream designers. Statement designers are not so much concerned with offending or scaring the audience that would be the buyers or press. Statement designers are more concerned with getting their point across, even if that means making a few sacrifices. (Duggan 243-270). A particular artist that can be meshed into multiple artistic fields is Robert Kushner. His career shows us that a fine artist is a fine artist, no matter what type of art they are interested in at the time. Robert Kushner is best known for his style as a painter. However, he dealt with performance and fashion for a short time earlier in his career. Kushners years of working off the wall and on the figure coincided with the development of conceptually based performance art in the 1970s (Morris and Meyers-Kingsley 311-330). He began his art career in the 1960s, where the article body begins, with the stance that the idea of a project was more important than the object or project itself. The 60s were largely surrounded by counter culture and conceptual art, giving Kushner inspiration for his fashion inspired performance art. The Black Power movement had an influence on Kushner as well as Amy Goldin, a New York critic and painter. Goldin became Kushners intellectual ally, encouraging his burgeoning interest in writing about art, and acting as a sounding board for the ideas he would develop about his own work (Morris and Meyers-Kingsley 311-330). He incorporated his ability to crochet as a child into his conceptual pieces later in his life. He saw crocheting as a sort of gender-role reversal. He received a negative backfire to the crocheting during his days as a student at USCS. He described the pieces as neo-tribal frou frou (Morris and Meyers-Kingsley 311-330). The idea that a free-flowing interpretation of gender roles could be produced simply by swapping and intermeshing gender signifiers was very important to Kushners development. Just as the activity of crocheting became a sly, yet powerfully charged indictment of stereotypes and gender roles, Kushners costumes would become a site for questioning, spoofing and critiquing the cultural signifiers of clothing and body decoration†¦Kushner was interested in creating a dialogue by seduction rather than confrontation or didacticism. As his costumes developed, the artist increasingly reacted against what he perceived as the dour and pedantic nature of Conceptual Art (Morris and Meyers-Kingsley 311-330). Kushner spent the summer of 1970 in New York where he first attempted to combine sculpture, clothing, and performance. He began working with clothing and curiosity led him to try new things with the structural elements of clothing. When he decided to document his items, he went in a non-traditional direction and shot the pictures in a way that resembled a fashion show and photo shoot. Kushner rebelled against many other performance artists of his time by not being confrontational with his work. His costumes, as he called his pieces, were also different from many conceptual pieces of the time. They were fun and witty, something the conceptual world was not used to. During his shows, he announced the pieces as odd names that often times had societal or historical references, forcing the audience to associate the pieces with certain meanings. In 1972, Kushner introduced a new medium to his art. He began working with food as a material to make costumes. In multiple shows, he invited the audience to eat the food off of the models. In 1973 Kushner entered a new phase of his career that featured the influence of haute couture on his costume works and a consolidation of his performative aesthetic practice (Morris and Meyers-Kingsley 311-330). He became greatly influenced by Balenciaga and Poiret, presenting a line, the Winter and Spring Line, of costumes made in homage to Balenciaga. He then went on to create the New York Hat Line, a line of hats, and the Persian Line, a line that incorporated painted fabrics. Both before and after the performance the costumes were displayed on the walls of the gallery as paintings. I liked the idea that this painting, which hung on the wall and had its own internal order, could come off the wall and become a swirling, moving form' (Morris and Meyers-Kingsley 311-330). If there were ever a single fashion designer to be categorized as producing fine art, it would be Alexander McQueen. McQueen was known for his theatrical shows that were both personal and emotional. It says something about McQueen that the Gala is holding an exhibition in honor of him so soon after his death. McQueen first gained recognition with his graduation collection inspired by Jack the Ripper. â€Å"With breathtaking speed, McQueen was welcomed into the fashion establishment† (Givhan 36-41). McQueen was different from other designers in many ways. â€Å"Sometimes, McQueen would rip apart his own work, reusing the fabric for the next collection. He came of age during a recession and was never a snob about materials, happily incorporating mussel shells plucked from the refuse of a local restaurant and straw beach mats spied during a holiday at the shore† (Givhan 36-41). McQueen came from a working class family and never succumbed to the posh world of fashion that surrounded him. â€Å"His clothes reflected a cold realism about lifes unfairness, its cruelties, and inevitable end. And his audiences were drawn to the beauty that emerged from that angst† (Givhan 121-126). â€Å"McQueen offered a clear-eyed vision of the harshness of life that, perhaps, only the working pooror those from truly meager circumstancesare honest enough to acknowledge† (Givhan 121-126). Museums today are beginning to show fashion as contemporary art. An example is the sister design team, Kate and Laura Mulleavy, behind Rodarte. The sisters werent trained in fashion design, however they have the ability to create fashion lines that rival others. They identify with their pieces as art objects (Fensom 62-71). Unlike most others, Rodarte create their pieces as sculpture to be supported by the body, rather than being made to fit the body. Some of their runway shows have been engineered to appeal to the art and museum sense rather than the fashion sense. It was created so that viewers could see the pieces as sculptures in the round. In addition, The Gala held an exhibition, Savage Beauty, celebrating Alexander McQueen’s career and contribution to fashion and the avant-garde. The show, a tribute to McQueen, includes work from his entire career. It also addresses some of the designers inspirations and influences, for example the Romanticism movement. The production, which took place at the Met, attempted to mirror the over-the-top and artistic environments that McQueen created for his shows (Fensom 62-71). The exhibition was one of the most famous and heavily trafficked in the museums history. Alexander McQueen’s designs were unique, they â€Å"weren’t clothes that influenced the wardrobes of ordinary people† (Givhan 52-54). Similar to Robert Kushner, Sonia Delauney, predominantly a painter, explored the world of fashion and had an exhibition in the National Design Museum: Color Moves: Art Fashion. The garments are extensions of her painting (Fensom 62-71). Delauneys presentation is different from that of what most museum-goers are used to seeing. The exhibition In Fashion: High Style also combines art and fashion. The show presents fashions past, present and future by exhibiting pieces from the museums extensive archives, garments on loan from todays top designers and design houses, and creations by up and coming students at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York (Fensom 62-71). The inspiration for the exhibition came from the museums discovery of garments from as far back as the 17th century. The exhibition also received influence from Christian Siriano and Project Runway, developing a contest aspect of the show. Is the art world using fashion as a way to get more bodies into museums? Or is it that, in the words of Virginia Woolf, nothing thicker than a knife blade separates the visionaries of fashion and art, and thus finally designers are taking their rightful place in museum galleries? (Fensom 62-71). â€Å"We can regard clothes then in two ways: from the point of view of their functional aspect we evaluate them according to those superlative qualities that enable them to fulfill their multiple functions of keeping us warm, giving us erotic appeal, adorning us, etc. , but we can equally regard them as beautiful objects of aesthetic contemplation by disregarding the concept under which they fall and therefore ignoring their functional dimension. They could be (as indeed they are) objects of admiration in a museum† (Miller 25-40).