The Bridge Between Conformity and Counterculture
“Gucci, Gucci, Louis, Louis, Fendi, Fendi, Prada at Syjuco”
Whether we like it or not, we are all victims of conformity. Huge, multimillion-dollar companies easily control where our money goes just by releasing articles of clothing and luxurious accessories with their logos slapped on. These are the materialistic items that rule the world. There is nothing incredibly extravagant or special about them, but still, we fall victim to wasting hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars on these “high-end” products.
A few examples of the name brand companies that make these gaudy products are Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Fendi, Chanel, and Prada. LV wallets sell for $500 and LV bags may range from $1,500 to $3,000. The other similar companies sell at similar price ranges; Gucci bags going for $1,500, Fendi belts selling at $500, and Chanel backpacks at $5,000. As expensive as these items are, when you’re in dense urban areas like Union Square in San Francisco, or walking through the streets of Hollywood, or in New York’s Time Square, you’ll see bags, shoes, and sunglasses with these high-end logos everywhere you look. How are so many people still buying these items? More importantly, why are these items so damn expensive? Well, these designer brands are priced so high because they are made from real animal skin, leathers that are made from exotic crocodile, lambskin, and cow. These materials are also coated with something that makes them waterproof. Additionally, you pay for it’s marketing “value”, so the bag is worth more just for the name brand. Still, the substantial amount of money spent on animal skin is absurd, yet many people continue to practically throw their money at these companies.
But, let’s look at it from a different standpoint. If the price goes into the thousands range for these type of bags, how much would a replica of these name-brand items be if they weren’t made of leather and animal skin, but made of cheaper materials like yarn and wool?
Stephanie Syjuco, the Queen of Counterfeit
Stephanie Syjuco is a Bay Area artist who studied at the San Francisco Art Institute and at Stanford University. Syjuco started replicating products that consumers spend a lot of money on, but instead of using the materials that make them so expensive, she uses much cheaper and more simple materials. Ultimately, she turns expensive products into cheap replicas, which she sells for a much smaller fraction of the original price. She contributes to the world of counterculture by satirically illustrating the corrupt system of value-making for such objects and highlights the economic issues that arise when we support these companies. Additionally, Syjuco often invites groups of participants to join her in her work. She offers workshops where she provides the inexpensive materials and gives the participants an objective, whether that may be to recreate faux marijuana or to replicate these status symbol bags. These individuals sit and craft their bags by using yarn, glue, and an outline for an hour or two or until they’re finished, and they’re encouraged to keep their creations. In 2006 she started “The Counterfeit Crochet Project”, she and a group of participants use craft materials, including yarn, to make bags that replicate the high-end name-brand bags. It is a global project, and the project has taken place in venues across the world including Beijing, Los Angeles, New York, Milwaukee, Manila, Istanbul, and Berlin. Here are some examples of the D.I.Y project:
Above is a comparison of a handbag that is made out of yarn and one that is made from real leather. The replica is on the left and the authentic bag is on the right. These are items that look relatively identical but they use different material, yet they vary dramatically in price. The bag on the left goes for $20 and the bag on the right sells for up to $2,500.
The artists’s project shows that these items are easy to make on our own, and they’re so much cheaper. We can spend $20 to make replicas that look exactly like (or even better?) the authentic piece that is on the market for thousands of dollars. Why aren’t these D.I.Y knock-offs booming, even if they look the same? Why isn’t everyone rocking a replicated “LV” bag made out of yarn? Why do we continue to throw away so much money and why do we continue to support these huge companies?
Well, the answer is simple. We care about our image.
How Designer Clothing Still Wins
Though the surface-level reason why these name-brand products are priced this way is because they’re made of real animal skin, the type of material they use is not the reason why they’re so popular. People don’t actually praise the use of animal skin and a waterproof feature; they’re popular because everyone knows how expensive these brands are. So, if you’re rocking a Louis Vuitton bag or a Gucci belt, you must have a lot of money to spend. Simply put, if you wear it, you’re rich. This all goes back to my original statement, that we are all materialistic. Although Syjuco creates a great point with her counterfeit objects, they still won’t be a “booming” product, and the fake LV won’t be showcased around Times Square or Union Square because we don’t want to be ostracized and we don’t want to be given weird looks. We want to look “good” in front of everyone, so we wear these “extravagant” things that show the world we have the wealth to keep us in style. We put a facade for the world. The social influence the world has on us keeps us buying materialistic items, and ultimately, it keeps us conforming to societal norms.
If this social influence can make us spend $1000 on a bag instead of $20, what other ways does it keep us from taking other things that we like and are scared to explore because we don’t want to be judged, and don’t want to be outcast? How else does it hinder our individuality?
Conformity Means No Hippie Modernism
Being in this L&S Art class, I’ve been exposed to so many great pieces of art that I have never seen before. These are forms of art that I don’t think many people are familiar with either. This lead me to wonder how our knowledge of art was influenced by our conformity; ideas like if it kept us from exploring other artworks that aren’t so popular and well-known. Sure, it’s “cool” to hang up a piece made by Picasso, or Vincent van Gogh, or Leonardo da Vinci, because everyone knows them. It’s cool to listen to “popular” artists like The Beatles and Pink Floyd. But what about photos captured by Ben Rose? What about art made by Clay Geerdes? These are two artists that contribute to the Hippie Modernism movement, and they’re not plastered around every art gallery and not everybody knows about them. But why not? Geerdes and Rose have great photos and pieces too, but since the genre of Hippie Modernism isn’t as popular, it seems like it doesn’t really matter. Is the fact that they have an arguably taboo form of art make them so unknown? Are people too scared to show their interest in this kind of art because they don’t want to be outcasted and labeled as “hippies”? Will we keep letting our conformity limit us to liking things that are well-known, and ignore/remain ignorant to all the other unique, yet not-so-popular forms of art?
