Following Martine Sitbon as the second womens designer to curate an A, it was clear that Veronique Branquinho was to present a very different vision of femininity and the modern woman in A#6. As a designer, Veronique has never been one for excessive embellishment and exaggeration, rather choosing to craft a romantic and classical wardrobe borrowing from masculine tailoring techniques – essentially underpinned with a dreamy softness of fabric and drape.

Wearing her influences on her sleeve, Veronique’s streak of darkness is always evident, as she counts the work of David Lynch and Tim Burton amongst her inspirations, and the music of Nick Cave, Radiohead and Joy Division as her soundtrack.

The 1975 Australian film ‘Picnic at Hanging Rock’ was the starting point for Veronique’s first presentation in Paris in 1997 – with crisp white shirting, longline blazers and tiered, pleated floor length sundresses setting a relaxed tone. Such classical, elegant minimalism followed through subsequent collections, with flared trousers, trench coats, capes and high-neckline blouses that resounded a film-noir, Katherine Hepburn-esque ease.

Over the years, Veronique has carried her aesthetic through several brooding, cinematic photoshoots with photographers such as Ronald Stoops, Alex Salinas, and Raf Coolen. Portraying women as both powerful and sensitive, the below images tell a sincere narrative of intelligent, instinctual heroines whose gaze penetrates far deeper than fabric.

Above: Spring Summer 1998 photographed by Ronald Stoops.

Above: Fall Winter 1999 photographed by Raf Coolen.

Above: Fall Winter 2002 photographed by Raf Coolen.

Above: Fall Winter 2004-2005 photographed by Alex Salinas.

Above: Spring Summer 2005 photographed by Alex Salinas.

Images, all rights reserved.

Luc Tuymans is one of Belgium’s most celebrated contemporary artists, a painter whose figurative oil paintings celebrate modern manufactured and natural artefacts with a covert symbolism that renders even the simplest objects complex through connotation. His work carries cultural subtexts that cover historical events relevant to his life and times, such as Belgian Congo conflict, World War II and the birth of the internet.

For Veronique Branquinho’s A#6, three of Luc’s works have been included alongside his bare-legged portrait by Alex Salinas (Luc clasping his trousers in one hand, standing on the riverbank with a knowing stare). These works are ‘The Rabbit’ (1994), and ‘The Parc’ (2005)  both subdued pieces that show Luc’s use of a cropping technique to show an investigative focus on often banal objects, and ‘Ballroom’ (2005) that showcases his mastery of perspective.

LUC ON HER: bitch, violence, vertical, crash, perverse

SHE ON LUC: macho, nighthawk, ambiguous, entertainer, who’s afraid of virginia woolf

Filep Motwary from the widely-read ‘Un Nouveau Ideal‘ fashion website interviewed A#6 curator Veronique Branquinho in December 2008. Here is his insight into Veronique and her creative past, present and future.

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In October 1997, longing to start her own label, Veronique Branquinho designed her first womenswear collection. Simultaneously, she designed the women’s collection for the Italian house of Ruffo Research for two seasons and participated in exhibitions all over the Belgium fashion scene (notably at Colette with Raf Simons). In January 2003, she enriched her world by adding a menswear collection. The first boutique in her name, opened in August of the same year. In 1998 she won Best Designer Award at the VH1 Fashion Awards. Late March, Earlier this year, Branquinho’s work retrospective opened it’s doors at the Fashion Museum of Antwerp (MoMU). The exhibition entitled Moi, Veronique: Branquinho Toute Nue (I, Veronique: Branquinho Totally Naked) exposed the designer’s clothing and references from the last decade. This conversation took place a few days before entering 2009.

Filep Motwary: You expressed interest in ARTS when starting your career. How did you finally chose to devote yourself in Fashion?

VERONIQUE BRANQUINHO: It was in the late 80’s, when I discovered the work of the Belgian Six that I started being interested in fashion.
I admired the work of Dirk Van Saene en Martin Margiela.
They spoke a language that I could understand, and most of all, could feel.
I wanted to communicate on the same way.
Before that, fashion just was something that belonged to another world.

FM: The memory of your Spring Summer 2005 collection is still haunting me. It was the only Branquinho show I attended so far and the soundtrack, OMD’s “Dream of me” has become on of my favorite songs since that day. If I close my eyes, I can see it all again. Tell me, how difficult is to create a good presentation, something as memorable as this, so cinematic, poetic and yet such a powerful effect at the same time?

VB: Thanks. For me, fashion is not only about creating clothes but most of all about creating a universe. The women, the music, the setting, the clothes are all equally important to me.
All these elements together make that you can create the right emotion.

FM: Your work looks as something very personal, yet has a clear Belgian identity. Why do you think Belgian fashion made such a strong impact , back in the late 1980’s and still continue to ROCK the world , by being so individual, to this day?

VB: All Belgian designers are very different and make very different collections. The thing that connects them is individuality. They all do their thing, apart from trend, in good and bad times. That ‘s what makes their work incorruptible and honest.

FM: You worked very close with fellow Cypriot, stylist, Panos Yiapanis, even before he became so big. How was this relationship?

VB: In the first place we are friends, even if we met trough our work. I have good memories going to music festivals and watching movies together.

FM: You once said in an interview: “To conquer sex is much more attractive that the act itself”. What is sex for you? How does it appeal in your work?

VB: Desire is the drive to satisfaction. I love to be on the road.

FM: Earlier in 2008, you had a retrospective exhibition of your work. Its been four months since it ended. What is the taste “in your mouth”? Do you feel that your work has made a first complete circle?

VB: In fashion we are always thinking of the future.
The exhibition did allow me to make a stop and look behind. 10 years is a good time to make up the balance. To be proud of the good things and learn from the bad things.
I left my luggage behind and feel light and free for the next 10 years. I always say that my collections are like my diary. Now it’s like I finished a chapter in my book and I’m ready for a new one. A virgin white page is always inspiring.

FM: Does it tire you, this whole procedure of fashion? The collections that come one after the other, the press? Do you have moments of solitude?

VB: My relationship with the fashion system is an ambiguous one.
I feel good when I’m creating, but sometimes I feel frustrated because of the high speed deadlines. Ready or not, every six months you need to show your work to the world.
That’s why I envy other creative people like writers, painters, musicians,…, they show their novels, paintings, music,…, to the world when they think it’s ready and not because there is a new season. But on the other hand, because of the time-pressure you can react quickly on the sign of the times. And that is what fashion is about: Communication.
Alert and with the finger on the pulse.

FM: What is Romance for you and how do you think it reflects through your work?

VB: Romance is the fuel of life. Indispensable.

Veronique Branquinho’s woman is an intellectual, sensual and mysterious spirit – a modern day sear with a sense of whimsy, who assumes beautiful garments as an easy and natural adaptation to herself. She is playful in her second skin. So to capture this muse, this complex play of lightness and dark, it is often Alex Salinas whom Veronique asks to tell this story.

Born and raised in Antwerp and having studied at the Royal Academy of Arts in the same city, Alex’s own story is closely linked with the rise and rise of Belgium’s fashion history, and his friendship and work with Veronique Branquinho is no exception to that. In A#6, Alex’s work can be seen in the portraits of all Veronique’s ‘beautiful men’, and in the fashion feature ‘As Black As Midnight on a Moonless Night’.

Alex’s photography carries a strong visual identity that seems to suspend reality – a technically brilliant style that captures fluid moments and expression yet allows it a stark and static quality, as exhibited even in his own self portrait above (a pillow grazing his nose seems it could be stuck on the wall or suspended forever there with it’s strong shadow behind, yet also seems ready to make it’s inevitable contact with his face).

The accompanying photographs of ‘wall’ and ‘Isabelle’ are a quietly personal contribution, with the intimacy of a bedside table and a football poster and the messy blonde hair of Isabelle (as she is seemingly followed down the stairs) conveying a stark human experience – a lack of pretense or staging, further pushing the candid and honest nature of his work.

ALEX ON HER: refined, sensitive, perceptive, dark romantic, tenacious

SHE ON ALEX: boys will be boys, endearing, pleasure lover, fairy-tale like, honest

www.alexsalinas.com

In conversation with Veronique Branquinho, I asked what stood out in her mind from the creation of A#6 – and for her it was the poignant dialogues that she shared with significant men in her life, played out in the pages of the magazine.

The first in this beautiful series is with Belgian painter Michael Borremans, who is captured so candidly by Alex Salinas – shirtless and grasping a guitar to his chest, wiping what seems a sly grin of his face.

Borreman’s work is featured across the following pages, straddling his worlds of fine oil painting and filmmaking, with cross-referencing works that display both a painterly beauty in his video piece ‘weight’ and an air of cinematic grandeur and human realism in his oil paintings ‘the skirt’, ‘blue’, ‘the consequence’ and ‘the performance’.

Michael and Veronique Branquinho each took five words to describe each other.

MICHAEL ON HER: attitude, sex, accurate, simplicity, cool

SHE ON MICHAEL: modest, timeless, sunday child, elegant, outstanding

A BLOG is delighted to present Dean Mayo Davies as our latest external author, as we showcase his work – thorough yet concise articles which are truly relevant in the world of A MAGAZINE.

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AS BLACK AS MIDNIGHT ON A MOONLESS NIGHT. The lynchpin or at least Lynch-influenced editorial photographed by Alex Salinas in A#6, curated by Veronique Branquinho.

Years after its publication, this foreboding shoot carries another resonance. What was at the time a celebration of Veronique’s archive 1998-2007, nearly ten years’ worth of it, is now viewed as perhaps one of the most definitive print celebrations of everything the designer encapsulated.

The recent closure of her company came with a heavy heart, but here, on paper, there is the black-gilded soul that built Branquinho into such a developed, evocative voice. The darkness, the ‘romance for the doom generation’ that formed the part-core of her work explored over 26 pages with models Anouck Lepère, Kim Peers, Tamara Van der Perren, Merel, Lara Streck and Gersande Coudyser.

Her gang is deeper than surface aggression however. It’s claret-red and sophisticated. A quiet brutalism, her silent assassins wear silks and le smokings. And if subcultural groups – teds, mods, rockers, punks, ska boys – are so important to the history of contemporary fashion and youth identity, then these bruised, pristine girls are Veronique’s very own subculture.

It’s a celluloid moment that has somehow remained timeless – as enigmatic today as ever. Her mood is one still so relevant to fashion and fashion culture. The embodiment of eternal.

Underlying Veronique Branquinho’s garments and accessories is a dark and sexual undercurrent, captured beautifully in this Flemish forest. Belgian photographer Alex Salinas shot a selection of Veronique’s pieces hanging in the trees – a giant mobile of boots, sandals, stilettos, underwear and other accessories decorating two stunning birches. They are chosen from across nearly a decade of Veronique’s work, ranging from 2000-2008. Entitled ‘Fetish Tree’, the photograph carries an air of perversion: are the leathergoods and lingerie a part of some fantastical erotic ritual in an enchanted wood, or victims of a crime, hanging in their mass grave?