FOOD 78 BOOKS BO FASHION 73 TRAVEL 76
Queen of Cling
One of the most innovative and original British designers Pam Hogg returned recently to Glasgow to open her latest collection — in an art gallery. Sue Wilson and Tessa Williams report on how the barriers between fashion and art are being broken down.
While purists might balk at the idea of a fashion designer’s work being shown in a major Glasgow art gallery. Pam Hogg, whose new collection is on display at Kelvingrove as part of their New Arts series, sees nothing odd about it. Apart from the fact that the aim of New Arts is to show work from outside conventional art forms, Hogg does not think of herself as a fashion designer. ‘I'm anything I
want to be.‘ she says. ‘I do see myself as an artist, I’m not a fashion person. Fashion is just the medium I‘m using I
for my art at the moment.’ Clothes
have been a means of self-expression .
ever since 70$ styles led her astray from her Spiritualist Church background. ‘Hot-pants and platforms stole my morality.‘ she says.
She has been using the medium of fashion for some time now with
of awards she won while studying
Fine Art and Printed Textiles at Glasgow School of Art (‘They thought I was doing things that seemed more on the sidelines. It was only when I started to pick up all the
prizes that I was taken seriously. ‘) to her current reputation as one of the most innovative and original British designers. whose clothes are worn by the likes of Marie Helvin and Jerry Hall, and whose face has appeared on the cover of practically every style
considerable success. from the fistful : magazine in existence.
Hogg has no formal design training — she taught herselfto make clothes because she was unhappy with how her prints were being used, and ! began to want to see the whole process through from fabric to garment. At first it was something of a hit-and-miss process— ‘I didn’t know how to put the damn things together properly' — but she learned fast. and launched her first collection in 1983. It was intended more as a statement of a new creative direction than a career move, but, thanks to the reception she received. it turned out to be both. Since then she has produced two successful collections a year. picking up a Scottish Style Award for Fashion along the way, as well as being unofficially crowned , ‘Caledonian Queen ofCling‘. As this 7 suggests. raunchy. body-hugging styles are a Hogg trade-mark. along with images ofstrong. assertive '
, women. like those featured in her
The List 12 — 25 July 1991 73