curation

Taste is a matter of curation.

Think about who we might expect to have good taste: artists, art and art history departments, art collectors, art dealers, and museums. All these groups, for one reason or another, have to make frequent aesthetic judgements. And, importantly, all these groups participate in some kind of curation.

Curation is a matter of selection. Museums, as premier curators, have massive collections that are designated to an artist, time period, style, etc. These collections are made up of pieces that have been selected, and what is consistent between the objects in a collection is their relation to a concept. Collections are representations of concepts. Those who have good taste, then, are those who can produce a collection of works that relate well to one another and ultimately communicate a concept or aesthetic idea.

Taste can be demonstrated with good collections: clothes in a wardrobe, songs in a playlist, books on a bookshelf, decor in a room. Poor curation is a failure to create a cohesive collection as opposed to a failure of any given object; bad outfits are not the result of bad pieces but rather bad styling. A collection of well curated objects effectively communicates their interrelations to the viewer. We especially prize collections that give us unique insight and communicate a unique aesthetic ideal; the more complex this conversation between a collection and its audience, the better. An outfit made up of high-end brands is not inherently better than regular clothing items, but high-end brands have more particular items that can communicate more particular ideas. If a collection can effectively communicate a specific theme, the collection is deemed to be good. However, finding beauty takes time and familiarity with a collection, and so we must observe carefully and generously.

Anything can be beautiful in the correct context, but the ability to locate that context, the ability to relate a work to a concept, is one that requires skill, knowledge, and creativity. It is easy to simply call something beautiful. It is not so easy to explain its beauty.

There is also a sense in which artists curate. They choose the colors, the method, the form, the medium, and each of these factors contributes to the piece, and the piece itself is the collection with each constituent is curated by the artist. A skilled artist, in their skill, has access to a wider variety of components for their collection as some components are locked behind the barrier of skill. If the components come together and communicate themselves, then we call that piece beautiful. Judgments of individual pieces are the same as judgments of collections, just done on a different scale. When we judge a painting, we judge it not by the quality of any individual stroke but by the gestalt that is the painting. When we judge a collection, we judge it not by the quality of any individual pieces but by the gestalt that we call the collection. Artists, who curate colors, mediums, methods, etc. into works, and curators, who curate works into collections, may have different practical barriers–the artist is limited by skill and the curator by funds–but the fundamental activity is the same: curation with conception. Taste is ultimately a judgement about the curation presented. Aesthetic judgements are not performed in isolation but rather directed at some concept or aesthetic ideal.

—Practical Application

Thinking about taste as curation allows one to build their aesthetic senses. There is a strong sense of curation in fashion. Fashion designers curate collections and design each part of each outfit. Fashion stylists and enthusiasts match items across collections and designers to come up with a cohesive outfit or wardrobe. When we choose different items, we invoke the ideas behind each item in the form of an outfit.

I think this is why some are drawn towards buying from the same brand: we enjoy the ideas invoked by the clothing and brands are often aesthetically cohesive, making wardrobes and outfits easy to build. However, we very much rely on the aesthetic vision of another when we do this, and so the outfit and wardrobe are not truly our own.

Another common approach to fashion is buying outfits. This means that the activity of curation applies only to this outfit, meaning there are only a few items that have to relate to one another. This creates a problem for one’s wardrobe, however. Because their wardrobe was created with particular outfits in mind, it is not guaranteed that items across outfits will go together.

The opposite approach to fashion is to think exclusively about our wardrobe. This approach often leads to minimalism, as more peculiar and specific items don’t pair with enough other items to make it worth it. A common version of minimalism is to wear what is essentially the same outfit. But this doesn’t have to be the case. Surely we can maximize versatility and diversity.

Here is my suggestion. In building a wardrobe, we are building a collection, and in building a collection, we must curate. So, our primary aim should be curation directed by an aesthetic ideal, with a secondary aim of keeping a versatile wardrobe, and a tertiary aim of maintaining a diverse pool of outfits.

This is why Pinterest and mood boards are so useful: they give us tools to think about the macro level first. This is the essence of fashion inspiration. Once we have a macro level understanding of what we want, we can select pieces based on practical versatility, and choose between pieces based on diversity. To put it simply: always look for inspiration (curation direction), buy what you will wear (wardrobe versatility), and don’t buy multiple of the same item (outfit diversity).