SKINNER - Policy of Truth II

We were never free
Just cost effective
-
MS Paint, Drift, 2025

I sing for culture
-
Billy Idol, Flesh for Fantasy, 1983

Off to the Shows. No time for a second coffee, 97 Fahrenheit, I'm doomed.

'Fashion these days is like beating a dead horse.'

Where does this come from? Is it a stroke?

Google AI: " "Beating a dead horse" is an idiom that means to continue
discussing or pursuing a topic that has already been resolved or is
no longer relevant. It implies that further effort is futile and a waste of time. "

Thanks, Google. Shall we all go to the Beach now? Isn't it crowded enough there?
And if we go on with beating that horse, who'll gonna pay for it?
Bringing up an old trope - Isn't money the mark where it all
becomes shallow and goes to hell?

After a culture-crippling pandemic people kept their loungewear and moved on
to watch horrible wars in real time on TV. The other half gets killed in real time.
Trauma is here to stay.
There is more essential than self-styling. Life is stressful, complicated and
bears indifference. It doesn't matter in which clothes people are getting killed.
But sometimes you need nice things to know what life is worth living for.

Often I don't have any idea why people in good will are still starting
to create fashion, even burn a lot of others' money for studying it.
Do you think that the right marketing is bringing the soothing circus back?
Or worse, you're reinventing it? It is fair and slow now - nice try.
But is it also exciting and worth it? Can it be relevant?

And then you snap back:
"Why are you shooting this and why are you doing it backstage?"
Mmh, let me think. Is it paid well? Nope, it's mostly not paid at all.
"Do you think you will be paid well in fashion? Jerk."
Right, Steven Meisel, Jürgen Teller, Annie Leibovitz got paid.
They were utmost respected as essential part of the game,
when Fashion Photography was manadatory.
These times are over. But they shouldn't be.

There goes my bus, fu*k it.

Bring the Positivity. All Fashion Graduates are natural born artists.
It's important to keep that up, hoping that it will pay off for everyone
involved. Fashion is no art to be presented easily and affordable.
Blood, sweat, tears and money and then how it shows off depends on
the right light and angle. "Or the right Influencer wearing it, true...?"
Well, that... has actually made the art cheaper, in every sense.

Besides: How did we come to the point where true ambition and talent
doesn't lead necessarily to any worthy and sustainable success anymore?
Is it because boring and repetitive stitching around, solely with
marketing in mind, kills the magic? "Damn Heretic!"
But it's true, there is no rule to Fashion, Fashion is there when it's time.

200 meters to go, sure, where the crowd hangs...

Here are my two pence on it. I shoot Underground Fashion because it is for
the thrill of a short moment when the fiddling wannabe-designer, the
painting and sculpting of MUAH and the being bored of a samewise short paid
model come together for the original sense of cool. I don't see it all the time
but the few times this really happens are worth it. I wanna be there at this
genius moment to show it in best light. I want the effort to pay off,
including mine at last.

That is my ambition and it is delicious when the ambition is there by design.
Here is where hope rises that we all still could make this troubled place
a cooler one with a vision, mutual respect and support.

I prefer to beat / shoot only horses that are alive and kicking.

"Hi there...! Uuhh, what was that, sounded like ripping..."

Words and Photography by Peter E. Reiche / @peterereiche

DesignerInstas - Scroll over Shot

HS Reutlingen

@hochschule.reutlingen