The MET: Camp - Notes on Fashion

Entrance to the exhibit

The theme of this year’s MET Gala was ‘camp,’ prompting celebrities to dress in outrageous outfits. At the time of the event’s photos overwhelming my Instagram feed, I had largely dismissed camp as something to be appreciated only by teenagers abusing a Snapchat filter. Personally, camp just seemed unsophisticated and, well, weird. However, the Camp: Notes of Fashion exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art showed me the nuances of camp revealing a complex and elusive concept. 

Presentation

Camp is an attitude of sorts well captured by its French origin se camper which means ‘to flaunt’ or ‘to posture;’ camp is not one thing, but rather a complicated and calculated art of presentation. Large parts of camp are related to how one stands to create an ideal form or ‘beau ideal’ such as contrapposto—standing in a way in which the arms and shoulders balance out the hips and legs—and often having an arm akimbo—hands on one’s hips with elbows turned outward. As someone who would like to try ballet one day, the importance of graceful precision is a value shared with camp. In a more quotidian application, elements of camp can be applied when taking pictures. A person’s image in our society is largely dependent on how she is self-branded dominantly through photos on social media. People amplify their presentation by trying to create their own beau ideal simply by having their arm akimbo. Camp is all over social media which contributes to how tricky it is to see the reality behind the images. Does a person genuinely have as much confidence as their image presents, or have their simply mastered the art of flaunting?

Works of Art

Many of the above campish elements can be found paintings and sculptures. Many classical Greek sculptures use contrapposto stances to enhance the human form. In this manner, camp is similar to humanistic art as both attempt to extol the human form. Additionally, works by French painter Hyacinthe Rigaud depict French King Louis XIV, the self-proclaimed ‘sun king,’ making campish poses on multiple occasions. If a drama queen like Louis XIV uses camp to profess the absolute nature of his ruling in propaganda paintings, there must be some force behind the idea. Truthfully, the outlandishness of camp makes the aesthetic one this is not very convincing unless the subject treats it with unyielding confidence. It seems that the camp aesthetic favors the artificial and controlled over the real. Impressionistic works rarely have camp elements because they are too focused on the instant impact, not the legacy of the scene at hand. Camp is effective for some styles of art, but not all. It is unfair to say that camp makes a work seem fake, but it certainly adds a component of fabrication to the works.  

Portrait of Louis XIV (1694) Hyacinthe Rigaud 

Louis XIV in Coronation Robes (1701) Hyacinthe Rigaud 

LGBTQ+ Representation

Part of the MET exhibit was devoted to Christopher Isherwood’s breakdown of camp into high camp and low camp in this 1954 novel The World in the Evening. High camp, defined as the aesthetics akin to haute couture and ballet, was favored in Isherwood’s mind. In contrast, low camp was for gay men wearing sailor suits and tight fitting clothes as evident in Paul Cadmus's The Fleet's In. While Isherwood does grossly stereotype in his example, his work does draw attention to the prevalence of camp in gay culture. The exhibit goes on to include a very public and scandalous trial in Britain in 1871 in which Ernest “Stella” Boulton and Frederick “Fanny” Park were two cross-dressing men accused of sodomy among other ‘indecencies.’ The exhibit argues that camp was an important element to Stella and Fanny’s acquittal. In a letter, Fanny described his actions as being ‘camp’ and the judge and jury were unfamiliar with the terminology, therefore this secret language protected the defendants. Camp seems to ride a delicate line between representing and stereotyping the LGBTQ+ community, particularly gay men. I think the uncertain nature of what exactly camp is protects it from criticism of this tension, but it is there. 

The Fleet’s In (1934) Paul Cadmus