Baret met een bol van leverkleurig zijden fluweel en een rand in dezelfde kleur vilt after 1942

This hat, made of velvet and felt, by Maud & Nano has got me thinking about color. I often use a limited color palette in my own work. There's something about the discipline of restricting your options that lets you really play around with other elements, like texture and form. The felt and velvet here, they're almost the same color, but they feel totally different. The velvet is shiny and kind of slumped, while the felt is matte and stiff. Look at the way the velvet folds over itself! It reminds me of when you’re painting wet on wet, how the colors bleed and blend, creating these unexpected, soft edges. The artists are setting up a conversation between the materials, between the sleekness of the velvet and the dryness of the felt, it makes you think about softness and hardness, luxury and utility. This piece is a far cry from the conceptual explorations of someone like Man Ray, but I’m interested in how these artists play with the idea of dressing as art, and pushing the boundaries between the practical and the purely aesthetic.