Saturday, March 13, 2010

Turquoise Esprit Shirt with a Little Pink Fur

I just returned a shirt to Esprit that cost under $20.  As I was on my way there I started to wonder if I would actually raise more suspicion returning such a cheap clothing item.  I was never one to return clothing before doing this project, so I still don't really understand the culture of it in a normal situation.  When the clerk at the register asks "why are you returning this?", I'm never sure what seems like a strange answer... "It didn't fit"... "I changed my mind"?  I have come up with much more intricate stories, like "I got it as a present for a friend, but then we had a falling out, so now I don't want to give it to her".  It is probably a good thing that I am generally compelled to brevity by nerves.

Here's the Esprit shirt, before returning, after alteration, right-side-out:


The turquoise shade guided my purchase.  I thought it would go really well the pink fake fur that I like to use.  I sewed little tufts of fur into the seams.  I wanted to give the feeling that it was sprouting from the interior of the shirt, like something organic spreading.  Here's an inside-out shot:


Just little bits of fur, tucked into places that the clerk wouldn't see when I returned it, even if they had to look into the shirt's neck a little to find the tag.  Here's a detail shot:


I had considered also adding some little branching forms, the sort that I would cut out of the little sheet paintings I've made with palette scraping and acrylic gel medium:


But once I'd sewn in the fur, I felt like there was a nice simplicity, an almost parasitic feel to it that I an additional element might disrupt, so I returned it with only the pink tufts inserted.  What do you think?  Should I have added more?

2 comments:

  1. I love the fur! I think this piece is complete as-is!

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  2. I want more "why are you returning this" narratives!

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