Paulina Sokolow in conversation with the artist behind Italophilia

Mats Gustafson, Mikael Janson and Liselotte Watkins had no ties to Italy of any kind. Nonetheless, in different ways, it would become their destiny. This exhibition at CFHILL presents three series of paintings and photographs by these three artists. Each of them was produced in a different time, and each captures a sparkling shard of Italy. Paulina Sokolow had a conversation with all three artists.

In the 2010s, there was a certain young model whose name seemed to be on everybody’s lips. She was in all the important Paris Fashion Week shows, and in 2012, she opened the season by hitting the catwalk at the Chanel Haute-Couture spring show at Grand Palais. The young woman in question, of course, is Cara Delevingne. That same year, Mikael Jansson was asked to produce an editorial for W fashion magazine. He was already a well-established superstar by then, and was afforded absolute artistic freedom. He chose Sicily, so Sicily it was. Apart from Delevingne, the editorial featured the small Medieval village of Noto, which is located close to Syracuse.

Sicily is fabulous, of course, but what made you choose that particular little village?
— It was my choice, and my inspiration to go there came from a film I saw when I was younger: L’Avventura, which Michelangelo Antonioni made in 1960. We based our shoots around the locations where the film was shot. The whole town has since been declared a World Heritage Site, and it’s full of exciting old architecture. But what I was after was that special mood. I’m often inspired by films.

So, the photos weren’t just inspired by the locations–but by the film itself, too?
— I find Antonioni to be an enormously fascinating filmmaker, whose work is very exciting from a visual point of view. I coupled the mood and atmosphere he captured with my own assignment. The slow, thoughtful, and poetic touch, with a dash of humour thrown in–I paired the ideas together. I can remember many times when I’ve gone to Sicily for shoots, and it floors me every time. The landscape is more austere, rougher, and it has a North African quality to it. It makes for a very exciting blend.

You mentioned humour. My favourite picture in the series is the one where Delevingne is dressed in black, and sitting in a church with a group of old women in the background. Where exactly did you do that one?
— Ah, that was actually in a church steeple with a balcony. To get there, you have to climb a narrow spiral staircase, which is less than a metre wide. Up there, somewhere between 20 and 30 metres above ground, there was an open space with a window. I wanted a location that felt sacral, yet spartan. We had to use a crane to get the chairs up there, but the old women, some of whom were over 80 years old, ensured us they didn’t mind taking the stairs. “No, no, no problem!”

Other settings used in the series are more lavish. Are these also taken in Noto?
— Yes, that one is in a private residence; we did the photo shoot in the bedroom. And that one where you can see the ceiling is actually in a church. That might actually be nearby, in Syracuse. I don’t quite recall.

The recent works of Liselotte Watkins suggest the emergence of a new reality. In these pale, pastel-coloured interiors, objects and pieces of furniture are laid out in what looks like geometric arrangements, or puzzles. A pedestal, a chair, a headboard, a bust. These innocent subjects seem to invite an interpretation that would frame the works as light-hearted, decorative depictions of traditional South European homes. But is that really what we’re looking at here? The windows and the paintings themselves appear to serve identical functions: offering peepholes of sorts into open landscapes, into a melancholy sense of distant freedom, a “time before”.

Liselotte, you live in Rome. What was it like to live in a society that was completely shut down?
— It was no fun at all! Although I’ve tried to live as I always do, I can still tell that my painting has changed as a result. It’s all really brought home to me how we live in our rooms. This is another Italy, one that you’ll never see as a tourist.

“Italians have only two things on their mind. The other one is spaghetti.”

Could you tell me about the context in which your six illustrations in this exhibition at CFHILL came about?
— 1987–9 was an intense period, and personally, I found myself involved in a lot of projects in Italy at the time. Before then, I hadn’t spent much time there. But for a few years, most of my clients wereconcentrated in Italy, even though the actual fashion shows happened in Paris. It all began with two dynamic sisters, Franca and Carla Sozzani. They were already influential at the time, and they remain so today. It was Carla who introduced me to designers like Romeo Gigli, and encouraged me to work with them. That same year–it must have been 1987–she was chosen to launch and serve as founding editor of Elle Italia, the Italian edition of Elle. Around that time, she also began to collaborate with Gigli, and his collections soon became enormously influential. That’s when I drew these illustrations: the coat with the green background, the dress with the red background, and the dress with the white one. I think they hired me because they had seen my pictures in Marie Claire.

What was it that made Gigli so special?
— The 80s silhouette was very broad-shouldered–it was an aggressive kind of fashion. Gigli made a radical break with all that. He went for rounded shoulders and high waists–very romantic, feminine shapes. I think you could even call them poetic. Around that same time, a group of Japanese designers, like Yamamoto, appeared on the scene, and also diverged from the dominant styles of the 80s, but they were much more into black. This collaboration between Carla and Gigli was more lyrical, somehow. After working together for three years, they ended up parting on rather acrimonious terms, actually. They sued each other, and he’s been banished to the periphery of fashion ever since.

The Vogue cover with Mats Gustafson’s illustration with a red backdrop marks an unmistakable shift. Characteristically sensitive, bare shoulders are visible through the transparent fabric, which is merely suggested by thinned-down horizontal brushstrokes. Instead of emphasised shoulders, the slope of the long neck, rather, follows an almost straight, unbroken line. The hips are indicated by a soft curve, and the posture is S-shaped, like a Medieval Virgin Mary. This expresses a cautious, listening attitude rather than anything forceful or muscular. A change was coming.

So, you worked for both of the Sozzani sisters?
— In 1988, I began working with Franca at Vogue. Maybe she only wanted to have me there to get back at her successful, famous sister–I can’t say. These three drawings were used as covers for a supplement. One of them was about swimwear, and this other one is wearing wide trousers.

Do you think, in hindsight, that your encounters with the Sozzanis and Gigli brought about any change in your own process?
— It’s quite interesting that CFHILL asked me specifically for my 80s work from Italy. My agent and I are actually considering making an edition of prints, and our plan was to start out with some of these pictures. I continued working that way throughout the 90s. But then, my style changed. As a fashion illustrator, exaggerated silhouettes had started to feel a bit stale to me–and I suppose I actually deserve some of the blame for that sharp, broad-shouldered 80s look. I began to work in a different way.

It’s going to be great to get to see these paintings first-hand. So far, I’ve only seen them on Instagram. They’ve grown a lot more intricate, more charged. Like a grenade, about to go off. It could all just explode at any moment! You’re going to be showing them at a major exhibition later this year, right?
— Yes! There’s going to be an exhibition at the Millesgården Museum this fall. I’ll be showing more objects there, too. It feels kind of special to be around all these old men. Last summer I did Villa San Michele, and now it’s Carl Milles’s home. Milles and I have rather different perceptions and experiences of Italy, but I think that will make for a great contrast!

What could possibly be more Italian than a bright red ladies’ shoe, with a pointed toe and a stiletto heel? It was the 80s, and Mats Gustafson was already a well-known figure in Paris, the heart of the fashion industry, where he had been working for a couple of years. One day, he was introduced to the legendary sisters, Carla and Franca Sozzani.

What do you mean?
— Well, this is the thing: where are all the men? In my paintings, you’ll only find children, still lifes of food, and women. The good life, all the stuff that comes to mind, really isn’t there all the time. It’s actually full of arguments, cramped quarters, sweating, and lots of laborious household work. Among other things, I painted a linen cupboard that belongs to the mother of one of my daughter’s friends.