This is pure genius! News from Repubblica.it (in Italian).
Serpica Naro, young anglojapanese artist and fashion-maker, was supposed to close the Milano fashion week (Settimana Della Moda) today. BUT (suspence …) Serpica Naro does not exist!
The organizers were fouled by the creative Italian collective Chainworkers. Serpica Naro is in fact an acronym of San Precario (depicted in picture), the newest of a long list of saints but this time with a reason.
San Precario is the protector of all the atypical workers (co.co.co., co.co.pro., and in general everyone that has a job with zero labour rights). [In the last 5 years, in Italy, most of the new workers have lost all the labour rights that were conquered by previous generations].
Chainworkers activists created an interesting ‘look book’ of Serpica Naro and a cool official website (with fake fashion magazines reporting about Serpica) and a bunch of other sites speaking about her, and an Italian press office and an English one and a Japanese one and a fake showroom in Tokyo and in London.
More clever is the fact that the same Chainworkers started attacking Serpica Naro accusing her to exploit anti-globalizations mottos just to sell fashion. And they also spread on some homosexual mailing lists news about the fact Serpica Naro had fouled in 2001 the japanese homosexual community just in order to use it for self-promotion.
Let me close with this. I don’t know if what I wrote is true: it is totally possible that Serpica Naro does exist and I have been fouled. Just remember that nothing you read/listen anywhere is necessarily true (not here, not on newspapers, not on television). You have been warned….
Some info:
The official Serpica Naro site is http://www.serpicanaro.com/
And here the biography of Serpica Naro from the site of SettimanaDellaModa: http://www.settimanadellamoda.it/serpica.htm
Biography from http://www.serpicanaro.com/
Tokyo based anglojapanese Serpica Naro has built up a strong reputation as a young designer who has consistently pushed the boundaries of fashion design.
She graduated from Bunka Fashion College and is internationally known for innovative use of high tech fabrics and unusual cutting techniques. Her experimentation in areas removed from the mainstream have included the invention of disguise clothing as well as pioneering the use of reflective fabrics and bandages in fashion collections. Her diffusion collections have included the legendary NonConform range, the indispensable work wear of the late 90’s, now revered by collectors.
Inspired by the fusion of cultures in urban Tokyo and London and its distinctively varied nightlife, Serpica’s following within the alternative and fashion industry remains strong.
She has recently clothed Chloe Sevigny, Steffen Westmark from The Blue Van, Dot Alison and Lady Laditron amongst others, and has been featured in Lucire, I-D, The Face, Dazed and Confused Japan, Intersection, le Monde Initiatives and many others.
Serpica stages many fashion/alternative events all over the world and is a household name in Japan, Korea and Hong Kong – as much for her lifestyle collections, which include underwear, accessories, as for her contemporary cutting edge clothing.
Serpica was the first designer to market work uniforms under her own name, and continues to be involved in such diverse projects as customising an environmentally friendly diaper for kids, and more recently, to introduce a revolutionary anti drying skin system, the DropLife System, to be launched in Japan soon.
“we are not low class, we are not high class, we are the new class”
Why save the world if you can design it?