March, 25th, 2013

New York | GHOST RANCH | SIKI IM

SPRING SUMMER 2013

“The skulls were there and I could say something with them. To me they are as beautiful as anything I know. To me they are strangely more living than the animals walking around. The bones seem to cut sharply to the centre of something that is keenly alive on the desert even though it is vast and empty and untouchable – and knows no kindness with all its beauty.”

Georgia O’Keeffe Breathe in me, O Holy Spirit — St. Augustine

A remote stretch of grey plains, sparsely covered in static vegetation; ancient mesas of sandstone and shale resting; expansive silent sky: This is the landscape surrounding Ghost Ranch, the isolated sanctuary in New Mexico where Georgia O’Keeffe lived much of her life. Among the spirits and sun-bleached animal bones that live there, an overwhelming sense of tranquility and quietness exists.

Not O’Keeffe’s work but herself and her home motivate Siki Im’s Spring/Summer 2013 collection. It seeks to exude the silence and calm of this setting, and the peace of O’Keeffe’s years at the ranch.

Draped long tunics, recalling the religious habits of saints, feel airy and light. The garments allude to the spiritual undertones of the collection. Loose knits made of Italian cotton hang restfully on the body. Materials like leather, pony, and dry wool reflect life on the prairie, and a deer skull – a recurring image in O’Keeffe’s work – appears in abstracted form in a print motif.

The fabrics — crispy-dense cottons; soft linen; fine suiting wools; all from exquisite mills in Japan, Italy, and the United States—are both strong and delicate. The colors, inspired by the plains, include tones of slate and bone along with Im’s favored black and white.

The collection also continues the experiments and explorations with silhouettes playing on proportions and mixing rounded and angular as well as elongated shapes. Voluminous pants are oversized on top and fitted through the legs. Shirts with higher necklines and variations in sleeve shape, including raglan and kimono sleeves, offer a different frame at the shoulders. Long wrap skirts, tunics, and chasubles, meanwhile, are both primitive and forward-thinking as well as tranquil and ascetic.

The bottoms in particular draw inspiration from spiritual sects and orders of monks. Pairing these garments with urban staples such as a t-shirt and a traditionally hand-tailored blazer creates an image that is simultaneously archaic and modern.

This concept extends to the footwear and accessories for the show: the sandals are a collaboration with outdoor company Teva, and the delicate and graceful necklaces of clay and animal bone have been worked together with Made By Eugene.

Combining Im’s updated minimalism with the purity and grace embodied in O’Keeffe’s life at Ghost Ranch, the collection is rugged and soft, quiet, harmonious, and strong.