The Ambiguity of Seamlessness: The Skin Ego and the materiality of fashion

Lee, Yeseung 2015. The Ambiguity of Seamlessness: The Skin Ego and the materiality of fashion. Critical Studies in Fashion & Beauty. 6 (1), pp. 75-93. https://doi.org/10.1386/csfb.6.1.75_1

TitleThe Ambiguity of Seamlessness: The Skin Ego and the materiality of fashion
TypeJournal article
AuthorsLee, Yeseung
Abstract

This article examines the materiality of fashion and the role it plays in the continuous making of personal and social subjectivities, through the author’s own experience of making seamless woven garments. Psychoanalyst Didier Anzieu’s influential notion of ‘the Skin Ego’ theorizes the initial formation of human subjectivity based on the tactile interaction between the mothering environment and the baby. As a garment maker, the author analyses the woven surface or garment as the extension of the Skin Ego, and inquires into the ways that the ‘separation’ from the earliest relationship and the unending attempt to repair this ‘cut’, might become figured in the ambiguity that is found in the seams and edges of garments. Integrating references from the fields of psychoanalysis, anthropology and cultural studies, this article suggests that the process of making and using garments – regarded as the interaction between human and material, as well as interpersonal, interaction – successfully reveals the ambiguities inherent in modern subjectivity.

JournalCritical Studies in Fashion & Beauty
Journal citation6 (1), pp. 75-93
ISSN2040-4417
2040-4425
Year2015
PublisherIntellect
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)https://doi.org/10.1386/csfb.6.1.75_1
Web address (URL)https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/intellect/csfb/2015/00000006/00000001/art00006;jsessionid=pjklnzt434vh.x-ic-live-03
Publication dates
Published01 Jun 2015

Related outputs

The white-clad people: The white hanbok and Korean nationalism
Lee, Y. 2022. The white-clad people: The white hanbok and Korean nationalism. Cultural Dynamics. 34 (4), pp. 271-296. https://doi.org/10.1177/09213740221117811

Eyes in the skin I live in: The incorporation of surveillance in mediatized culture
Lee, Yeseung 2022. Eyes in the skin I live in: The incorporation of surveillance in mediatized culture. Fashion Theory. 26 (2), pp. 185-210. https://doi.org/10.1080/1362704X.2019.1697509

Текстиль-сфера (Textile-Sphere): порог повседневных взаимодействий
Lee, Yeseung 2021. Текстиль-сфера (Textile-Sphere): порог повседневных взаимодействий. Теория моды: одежда, тело, культура (Fashion Theory, Russian edition). 62 (April), pp. 162-187.

Distinction by indistinction: luxury, stealth, minimalist fashion
Lee, Yeseung 2021. Distinction by indistinction: luxury, stealth, minimalist fashion. Luxury: History, Culture, Consumption. 6 (3), pp. 203-225. https://doi.org/10.1080/20511817.2021.1897265

The Textilesphere: The threshold of everyday contacts
Lee, Yeseung 2020. The Textilesphere: The threshold of everyday contacts. Textile: Cloth and Culture. 18 (2), pp. 160-179. https://doi.org/10.1080/14759756.2019.1652429

Apparition: the (im)materiality of Modern Surface
Lee, Yeseung 2018. Apparition: the (im)materiality of Modern Surface. Apparition: the (im)materiality of Modern Surface. De Montfort University, Leicester 09 Mar 2018

Textilesphere: To mark is to be marked
Lee, Yeseung 2018. Textilesphere: To mark is to be marked. Textile and Place. Manchester Metropolitan University 12 - 13 Apr 2018

Rethinking luxury through the handmade
Lee, Y. 2017. Rethinking luxury through the handmade. Animate Objects: Encounters between People and Things. Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge 13 Oct 2017

Seaming, Writing and Making Strange: Between material and text
Lee, Y. 2016. Seaming, Writing and Making Strange: Between material and text. Studies in Material Thinking. 14 Paper 06.

The Authentic Surface: Making Garments, Selves and Others
Lee, Yeseung 2016. The Authentic Surface: Making Garments, Selves and Others. In Pursuit of Luxury 2. LIM College, New York 06 May 2016

Seaming, Writing and Making Strange: Between material and text
Lee, Yeseung 2016. Seaming, Writing and Making Strange: Between material and text. Studies in Material Thinking. 14 Paper 06.

Seamlessness: Making and (Un)Knowing in Fashion Practice
Lee, Yeseung 2016. Seamlessness: Making and (Un)Knowing in Fashion Practice. Bristol and Chicago Intellect.

Seaming Hands: The Meaning and Value of the Handmade in Contemporary Fashion
Lee, Yeseung 2015. Seaming Hands: The Meaning and Value of the Handmade in Contemporary Fashion. Luxury: History, Culture, Consumption. 2 (1), pp. 61-80. https://doi.org/10.1080/20511817.2015.11428565

Seaming, Writing and Making Strange: Between material and text
Lee, Yeseung 2014. Seaming, Writing and Making Strange: Between material and text. The Art of Research V: Experience, Materiality, Articulation Conference. Aalto University, School of Arts, Design and Architecture, Helsinki, Finland 26 - 27 Nov 2014 Empirica.

The Poetics of Self-fashioning: Between nonsense and meaning
Lee, Yeseung 2014. The Poetics of Self-fashioning: Between nonsense and meaning. Fashion in fiction: style stories and transglobal narratives. City University of Hong Kong, China 12 - 14 Jun 2014

The Skin, the Garment Surface and the Production of Modern Magic
Lee, Yeseung 2014. The Skin, the Garment Surface and the Production of Modern Magic. Association of Art Historians 40th Anniversary Annual Conference. Historians 40th Anniversary Annual Conference. Royal College of Art, London 11 - 12 Apr 2014 Association of Art Historians.

Permalink - https://westminsterresearch.westminster.ac.uk/item/vqq23/the-ambiguity-of-seamlessness-the-skin-ego-and-the-materiality-of-fashion


Share this

Usage statistics

57 total views
0 total downloads
These values cover views and downloads from WestminsterResearch and are for the period from September 2nd 2018, when this repository was created.