Duran Lantink Interview

INTERVIEW   Jordan Richman

PHOTOGRAPHY   Theo Liu

LOCATION   CHÂTEAU VOLTAIRE, PARIS

DURAN LANTINK WAS THE DESIGNER DU JOUR before being chosen by the legend himself, Jean Paul Gaultier, to succeed him at the helm of his maison. It's the job a million people would kill for, and the Dutch designer didn't hesitate: he temporarily closed the shutters of his award-winning namesake label, left Amsterdam for Paris and claimed his golden ticket. Albert Camus once wrote, "The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion." For designer Duran Lantink, this has been his way of life since elementary school, whether piercing his ears, wearing dresses and rocking a pink mohawk. Crowned "the new enfant terrible of fashion" by Gaultier, Lantink now carries the expectations of a brand that carries legendary status. There is anticipation that his appointment marks the arrival of fashion's next visionary, saving the industry from its downward spiral. Whether he can meet those expectations remains to be designed, but the spectacle he creates is undeniable. Attending one of Lantik's runway shows can feellike entering a scene from Robert Altman's comedy Prét-a-Porter, with his surreal silhouettes parading past on supermodels like Rianne Van Rompaey. His collections reveal an audacious penchant for abstract, sculptural designs that obscure the body in heavy volume while playfully baring it in assless garments. Press-shy, he finds it difficult to open up about his work, preferring to communicate through his collections rather than pandering to the fleeting gaze of critics. Coaxed into conversation with The Travel Almanac, however, Lantink reveals that his creative process is not driven by fashion's established codes, but by an urge to trespass, and reimagine the form itself.

How has it been leaving Amsterdam and moving to Paris?

It's been great, actually. I travel between Amsterdam and Paris, but it's really good being based here. I enjoy it. The weather is good. I'm happy.

Where in Paris are you living?

In the 18th arrondissement in Marx Dormoy. It's a really great apartment. It's very light. All happy feelings at this point.

What is the mood of the neighborhood?

The neighborhood, I don't know. It's quite—I don't want to say edgy, because maybe that's not the best way of putting it, but it's very eclectic. There's different shops where you can get spices, and it's busy. The only thing that I find a slightly weird is that it's very male-dominated. You don't see a lot of women outside, which I find a bit sad. I haven't really figured out why that is. I've only been living there for a month, and to be honest, I'm not at home as much as I would like to be. But it's a nice neighborhood. People dress
amazingly. It gives me energy.

Have the new surroundings, and being at the Gaultier studio, influenced your work so far?

I don't really know, to be honest. Either I care a lot about my surroundings,  or I don't give a shit. I always just go with the flow, I guess. I'm never really super affected by what surrounds me. Most of the time, I'm more in my head than really present in the places I walk, if that makes any sense. 

Up until now, you have not done many interviews.

No, because I'm not a big interview person. I always hope nobody asks me anything. (laughs)

There is nothing you're dying to divulge?

Absolutely not. (both laugh) In the end, I always like this idea of people giving their own opinion on what they see. Sometimes it's difficult to find words for the work I'm doing because it's all quite personal. It's a personal perspective. I'm definitely better at communicating through shows, collections and clothes than actually talking about them. I always like it better when I read something back, and I'm like, 'Oh, that's a really nice perspective.'

Is your work often misunderstood?

I think the most misunderstood aspect of my work is that people find it gimmicky, which I definitely disagree with. I always see my clothes as very normal clothes. We always have that conversation in the studio. I'm like, "That's super commercial, isn't it?" Then people tend to say I'm crazy, and it's not commercial at all. I hope one day I'll wake up and people will see it as a very commercial thing.

Why is it that critics can't look beyond the spectacle and see what you see?

Maybe they don't look hard enough. You know what I mean? They don't take the time to really look at it. They just quickly glance, and they're like, 'Okay, well, that looks a bit gimmicky. We really think about it from bottom to top, how it looks, and I do find the beauty in it. I think all my clothes are really well-made. Sometimes I find it slightly romantic, but I hate the word romantic. It's just that my love for clothes and my love for fashion-it's something I feel the urge to show. It's the way that I see beauty.

You've been referred to as the new enfant terrible of fashion. Is this how you would describe yourself?

That's what other people say about me. Again, I just enjoy fashion. I like making things that might come across as a shock for some people, but when I look at my collections, I just think they're nice and beautiful, and I don't necessarily see the shock effect. I know that Mr. Gaultier was the one who said that, and I know that he means it in a very nice way, but overall, I think I'm quite a normal person. I don't exactly see myself as an enfant terrible, even though I see it as a compliment.

Were you an enfant when you first realized fashion was the medium you would use to express yourself?

Yes, I knew this from a very young age. When I was probably eight or something, I would always pierce my ears, go to school in skirts and dresses, cut things up. It was really a way for me to communicate, for me to explore my own body and the way I wanted to be. It was something that felt very natural.

Tell me about Rietveld. How did your time there shape your design ideology?

Rietveld-it's an art school, and it's a very free school. It was really nice that they allowed me to be so free. I was never really interested in fabrics and all those kinds of things. I was much more interested in closing pieces and how to change the language of them. I think that in any other school in Holland, I would never have had the freedom to do that. They really helped me set my own rules and then figure out how I could support myself and evolve-how I could make things better and communicate better. Yes, I'm happy that I did Rietveld. It's a school that really suited me.

The theme for this issue is free will. I thought of the quote from Albert Camus, "The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion." Would you say this is your raison d'être?

Yes, that's very beautiful. I think that has been part of my whole life. Since I was a very young child, I would never do anything people would tell me to do. I had really big troubles in school. I've always felt that if there's rules, they are there to be broken and to show a different perspective. I think that's really important. That's been my motto in life since that time. Nobody could tell me what to do in terms of dressing. I remember when I was 10 years old, and still in elementary school, I dyed my hair pink in a mohawk. There was no way I was going to shave it off. I've always fought these rules that people have tried to apply to me and given them the middle finger. 

Fuck the rules.

I do that very naturally, and take the same approach with my work. I probably always will because I could never say yes and make a nice little polka-dot dress just because somebody tells me to. No, there's never going to be a polka dress if you tell me I have to make a polka dress. That applies as much today as ever.

Do you think fashion has the potential to be revolutionary?

Yes, it does. Maybe I'm being naive saying that, but fashion has always been quite revolutionary. If you look at punk culture, for example. There have been many moments in history where I think fashion has been part of a revolution. 

There's a lot of anxiety around the revolution happening in artificial intelligence right now. Do you use A.I. in your work, and do you share these fears?

For me, A.I. has always been quite interesting. My whole thesis in 2016 was about Artificial Intelligence. I used to work with a lot of dead stock, and I had this idea of using that stock and doing collages. There was an A.I. system that would do the collages for me, so that I could sell that to bigger companies, where they would implement my A.I. version and reproduce all their dead stock in a new collection. I have to say, I don't really use it anymore, because it doesn't have intuitive feeling. They can be as creative as they want, but they don't make mistakes. I think the best things are found in mistakes. I was very interested in it 10 years ago, but now I mainly use it for text writing, I guess.
I like machines, I like A.I., I'm not afraid of it at all. I am afraid of the people that are using artificial intelligence. I think the human mind is way more dangerous than any artificial mind.

If A.I. is the future, what is the most outdated idea in fashion today?

Commerciality. (chuckles)

How are you challenging commerciality?

Am I challenging it? I don't really know. I feel I just want to create things that I find interesting. There's people who hate it, and there's people who love it. They find it interesting or they don't find it interesting at all. As long as I have the idea that I'm feeling energized and positive about what I'm doing, that's how I'm challenging it.

Are your designs, then, an act of rebellion?

That's the thing I have trouble with - when do you become a rebellion? You would think I would become a rebel when I start burning actual buildings down. I just think that I have intuition, and I feel that's good. My intuition says I need to do this or that. I need to make that skirt shorter, or I need to change that form, or I need to show this, or I want to tell that story. It's not that I want to be a rebel, but it feels very natural, not a fake way of rebelling.

Can creative freedom exist within the structure of a fashion brand, where there are always compromises?

From my perspective, creative freedom does truly exist. I compromise very little. I don't really like the idea of compromising because then something becomes vanilla. In Dutch you say, "If you add water to the wine, it won't be as strong." I think there needs to be a strong vision, and you need to follow that. You just need to make sure that whatever you do, that vision comes to life.

Do you ever feel your own creative identity has become a case?

I feel trapped by my own identity all the time, but that's the fun part about it because you need to break out of it. I like the idea of being trapped by my own creativity, but then you go against it, and then something new comes out of it. I think that's a good conversation to have in my mind.

There's always a bit of comedy stitched into your designs. Can humor coexist with high fashion?

In my opinion, it can. I think humor is quite important. It's a way of processing the heavier
subjects in life. I do need a bit of humor in my work and in how I approach life in order to push through. It also depends on what you find humorous. If I look at my clothes, I take them very seriously. I do think there's a lightness in my collections, but that doesn't mean I find them funny. You know what I mean?

Sure. Do you find the fashion world quite funny, though?

I'm enjoying being in that space, but I don't find it laughable. If you're suggesting funny as in, I have to laugh about the whole fashion system, I don't necessarily do that. I try to focus mainly on what I'm doing myself and not pay too much attention to what is happening in fashion in general.

There can be a caricature-like absurdity to fashion.

Yes, I do think fashion has an absurdity, but I think so does daily life. I just try to stay true to what I believe is interesting to showcase. I don't see fashion as a gimmick.

You've established quite a distinct conceptual approach to augmenting the body. How did this start?

I think at a certain point, I was also done with the hybrid clothing thing, because I think a lot of people started doing that as well. Then I started thinking about how we could repurpose pieces without mixing them together, for example, by changing the shape of it. Let's say we have a denim jacket, and then we create a bold denim jacket, or we really wanted to create or make volumes with clothing pieces that we have laying around, not combining them together, but really changing their outline. That was my initial obsession with changing the form of a clothing piece.

When you create these new silhouettes, do you think first about how it relates to the body, or does it stem more from a sculptural starting point?

No, it's from a sculptural idea. In the beginning people were saying that I was changing the body, which I wasn't really doing. I was actually thinking more about changing the clothing piece rather than having a conversation with the body. It was always more of an object than something you would wear. In the end, you would put it on, but that wasn't the starting point. I think season by season, we started to think more about how it
relates to the body.

What are some of the strangest materials you've ever worked with for fashion?

Oh, we were using quite a lot of metal, which is not necessarily something you normally see, but then again, that's also part of fashion, I guess. We use everything in the studio. At a certain point, we were using chairs. Basically anything we can find, we try to make something out of it. One time we tried integrating a vacuum cleaner into a garment, which was quite weird. It didn't work out, though. (laughs)

The ideas that sometimes don't work for one collection, do you continue to experiment, and they maybe reemerge later?

Yes, they do. It's not something that we plan for, like, "Okay, we're using this for the next collection," and we don't exactly have an archive of things that we can take out of the fridge. But in the back of our minds, it's somewhere. It's always, like, you're in a fitting or you're working on something, and then you say, "Oh fuck, yes, remember we had that thing. Let's try that again." It pops up whenever we need it, I guess.

Is there anything that didn't work out that still haunts you a little?

There's something that's been haunting me, I think for over 10 years now, that I really want to do, but it is impossible. I can't tell you about it because then maybe people will do it before I manage to. One day, I will find a way to do it. I'm still actively working on it in my head. That's the weird thing, as I think this might be
the only thing that I'm keeping to myself.

Which is the next garment you're longing to subvert?

I like the idea of the skirt. Somehow it's such a non-piece, you know what I mean? If you think about the skirt, the first thing you might imagine is that it's a straightforward thing. If I think about a skirt, it becomes very conformative. Id like to explore that - h o w I could give that a different meaning. A skirt can be super sexy, obviously when it's super short, but I'm not necessarily talking about a miniskirt. I'm talking about a knee-length skirt, I guess.

I'm reminded of an exhibition I saw as a teenager that Mrs. Prada did, called Prada Waist Down. The whole exhibition was based on a selection of skirts that she made over her career.

Oh, wow.

I found a quote about Waist Down, which said the exhibition highlighted the garment's versatility in expressing movement, identity and femininity.

Very well put, Mrs. Prada.

The next step should be from the waist down, it seems...

Yes, or does the skirt always go from the waist down? You know what I mean? Is it really going down, or is it going up? (both laugh) I'm curious to figure it out.

That would be a great innovation.

Right? (laughs) I'm very curious about the skirt and how to get at a different meaning.

Do you think about gender when designing?

It's very important to feel the freedom to play with the human body. For me, it's always been important not to divide gender in all my collections. Like I was saying, when I was nine or 10 years old, I was wearing dresses, I was piercing my ears, I was wearing bras, whatever. I've always had the freeing feeling of playing
with every element there is in clothing. I find it very important not to think too much about gender roles. I try to avoid it, but then it's definitely impossible to
dodge it completely. For me, it feels very natural to play with all these different elements and to create my own world or my own language from them.

From your very first fashion shows, you had really top models walking the runway. How did you pull off this casting coup?

Marte Mei Van Haaster, the model, she was my friend from Rietveld. Then, obviously, you need a good casting director, which was Julia Lange at that point. I asked her agent Mo, very kindly—even though Marte had already said she would do it—if she wanted to walk my show. Then Leon Dame is a really good friend of another good friend of mine. I think Marte was also like, "Rianne, you really have to do this show." And then with Rianne Van Rompaey, I started meeting Leon, and that built this relationship. I'm very lucky with them, for sure.

It reminded me of the legend of Azzedine Alaia and his supermodel "daughters" like Naomi and Stephanie, always walking in his shows and getting all the other top models to walk for "Papa."

Yes, it was really that kind of situation. They were calling their friends and contacts. They've made a really great group of people that support me. I'm super happy with that. It's great to work with them. They're lovely.

Last question: Diana Vreeland once said "The eye has to travel." Is travel an important part of your process?

Yes, it is very important to me. From a very young age, I've always loved to travel alone. I would sometimes go into an alley, which would be quite dangerous, and I would feel this sort of anxiety in my heart. You know when you go somewhere, like a club or somewhere you know you should not be, and you get scared, or not scared, but you get quite excited. You're pushing your own boundaries. I think that's what traveling does. You tend to go into environments that you wouldn't encounter in daily life. For me, it's very important to find these sort of very unsafe things. Not necessarily go into dangerous places, but something that feels a bit unsafe is very exciting and could give me inspiration.

Not to psychoanalyze, but the experience you're describing almost mirrors your work.

You know the feeling that you get when you're doing something wrong. That's a very exciting feeling...

Trespassing...

Yes, trespassing. I love a bit of trespassing.