Beginning a new magazine with an ‘A’ inevitably prompted much word play, so when Dirk Van Saene, Walter Van Beirendonck, Gerdi Esch and their collaborators constructed NºA, there was much linguistic fun to be had.

With this in mind, the director of the Arnhem Fashion Institute, Angelique Westerhof, took the proposed A, B, C, D… concept for a real joyride, for her piece “Alphabet Soup”. Constructing five acrostic poems of the alphabet, Angelique chose names and concepts each pertaining to the spirit of Antwerp fashion – from Dirk’s world and the people and ideals within it.

Some you will know and recognise immediately (there is only one Martin, no?) but others are more cryptic and askew, such as the references to the Orthodox Jewish culture in Antwerp, with their Yarmulkas (skullcaps) and the Yom kippur (religious fasting holiday). Other words are rather ambiguous and vague, but help to paint a picture of the atmosphere of the fashion community, with their common inspirations and aspirations.

Rather than explaining all 130 of Angelique’s choices, we suggest a rather more organic and exciting challenge – to piece together the puzzle yourself.  With the help of a few queues from us, play with the cerebral links between the words, to allow yourself to arrive at your own vision of this intriguing word map. Push the boundaries of your knowledge to further explore the ‘A’ world.

Anarchist
Beyond
Craft
Dream
Experiment
Future
Genuine
Hidden
Innovative
Juxtapositions
Knowledge
Linda (Loppa)
Magazine
Nationality
Orthodox
Perseverance
Questioning
Radical
Sensuality
Tradition
Underground
Values
Walter (Van Beirendonck)
Xenophobia

Ann (Demeulemeester)
Bourgeois
Change
Dirk (Van Saene)
Emotive
Fashion
Generations
Homogenous
Incubation
Jurgi (Persoons)
Kickstarters
Labour
Majestic
New
Originality
Patrick (Scallon)
Quality
Research
Severe
Tuition
Uncover
Victorious
Wonderment
XI
Yom Kippur
Zone

Aloof
Boundless
Concrete
Desire
Escapism
Family
Gerdi (Esch)
Hierarchy
Integrity
Jointly
Kaleidoscopic
Liberation
Manufacture
Nico
Obscurity
Principles
Qualification
Raf (Simons)
Shy
Timeless
Unprecedented
Visionary
Wild
seXappeal
Yin
Zany

Alert
Bernhard (Willhelm)
Captivating
Diffusion
Ellen
Funloving
Global
Honorable
Inspire
Jubilation
Kindness
Luminous
Make
Natural
Outspoken
Provocative
Quietude
Romanticism
Statements
Torment
Uncompromising
Verve
Window
arickX
Yee (Marina)
Zen

Absolute
Belief
Chris
Dries (Van Noten)
Eclectic
Fever
Genius
Humour
Intuitive
Jobs
Kissable
Loving
Martin (Margiela)
Now
Personality
Quantity
Reward
Spell
Transform
Unique
Veronique (Branquinho)
Winner
X-Ray
Yearn
Zoom

Before there was A MAGAZINE, there was Nº – a concept devised by Antwerp Six designer Walter Van Beirendonck for the Landed-Geland fashion festival in Antwerp, Belgium in 2001. The first issue was curated by fellow Belgian designer Dirk Van Saene, who created NºA featuring Dirk Van Saene.

To view it online – click here.

The editor Gerdi Esch explained the concept like so:

“Why a new magazine?
We want to return to a poetic, fresh and “pure’ fashion magazine.
A magazine that makes a statement against homogenisation and for individuality.
A Magazine that is made out of respect for the design and the designer.
A magazine in which we want to question fashion because we are fascinated by it.
A magazine in which we want to share the parameters of the designers we love:
passion, emotion, fascination, spontaneity, craftsmanship, authenticity.
This magazine is initiated by fashion designer Walter Van Beirendonck as one of the fashion statements in the MODE2001 LANDED-GELAND project.
It will follow the rhythm of the fashion seasons, has a name that changes with the letters of the alphabet, and aims to be different, surprising and innovative.
Each issue will be host to a different guest creator.
Because we wish to oppose ‘globalisation’, we take up a clear and controversial position when it comes to adverts. We ask advertisers to depart from the usual marketing strategy and opt for a new creative adventure.
Our first guest creator is Belgian designer Dirk Van Saene, known for his ever-changing collections, his passion for couture and his cultural statements with non-conformist attitude to the system.
We are happy to present to you this first issue, ‘designed” in the same way as a fashion designer creates a new collection.
Thanks you Dirk Van Saene, for you creativity, thanks you all contributors for you homage to Antwerp, and thank you everybody to shared our enthusiasm.”

Gerdie Esch.

As such, we are proud to release NºA online on the 1st of May 2010, as the first of five special online releases, as a part of the history behind A MAGAZINE curated by. Keep reading as we divulge the contents of NºA, exploring the contributions within this issue, a true celebration of Antwerp and it’s fashion scene through the eyes of Dirk and his collaborators.

To be followed by:

NºB featuring Bernhard Willhelm – June 2010

NºC featuring Hussein Chalayan – July 2010

NºD featuring Olivier Theyskens – August 2010

NºE featuring Viktor & Rolf – September 2010

Welcome to NºA featuring Dirk Van Saene - the very beginning of the A story.

The essence of longevity in the creations and vision of Yohji Yamamoto is a rare trait in the fashion world – a world of constant turnover, trends and replacement. One facet that embodies this fact so readily is modelling, as beautiful young girls are chosen to represent these trends and then so quickly pushed aside for a new look, a new walk, a new attitude.

Kirsten Owen is one of the few models who has managed a longevity in the industry and staying power that does not branch from international superstardom and celebrity fame – she is no Naomi Campbell – but rather from a natural and transcendent beauty that so quietly surpasses directional trends. With a career that began in 1985 and has continued on and off since then, Kirsten arrived in the fashion world at a time of great change and an evolution in the avantgarde scene, with the rise of the Belgian and Japanese designers spearheading a race forward in design technique and a new aesthetic for the nineties.

For A#2, guest editor Gerdi Esch celebrates this calm, strong woman with a poignant and celebratory text that accompanies Kirsten’s own self portrait photography in rural Canada. The images possess a raw and unencumbered beauty, marrying the stark winter countryside with the intimacy of Kirsten’s lens turned upon herself both inside and outside. Movement and blurring add a sense of adventure and play to the images, removing any sense of a ‘produced’ photoshoot – revealing the human element. Kirsten appears pensive, serene and engaging. Everything a model should be, coupled with a natural grace and a grounded energy.

Gerdi on Kirsten:

“As a model she survived every trend in the last twenty years. She stayed her beautiful self. And every time I see her walk in Paris in that very own way of hers, I see that girl in front of me again. Because over the years she didnt lose that girl. We and our generation, too, we haven’t lost her. She still is an image, the image, inextricably bound up with those very precious 90′s when fashion repented, so to speak, and started looking for real, pure beauty.”

German choreographer Pina Bausch bought an intensity and emotion to the world of 20th century contemporary dance, as a pioneer of the ‘Tanztheater’ style that channeled German Expressionism into a union of genuine dance and theatrical methods of stage performance. Injecting realist, bohemian elements to her work such as stages filled with flowers, unusual musical styles and complicated stage sets, Bausch pointedly detached her work from the constraints of traditional ballet. With her company Tanztheater Wuppertal, Bausch toured the world with her original acts.

A#2′s guest co-editor Gerdi Esch was first exposed to Pina’s work in the 1980′s at Antwerp’s De Singel performance hall, who described her work as such:

“For a moment my world came to a standstill. I had seldom seen so much intensity in a couple of hours time. Tenderness and violence, caresses and blows, sweet dreams and nightmares, fear and lust, beauty and decay,  I saw it all in a flash and it took my breath away.

In one interview I read that as a child she would sit under the table from where she could observe the adult world. That her theatre was born there. At a Pina Bausch performance I also feel like a child sitting under a table that looks at the world, and looks and looks.”

Above: Pina Bausch

Accompanying her praising words are these stills of Pina’s work taken by Maarten Van den Abeele -monochromatic and highly contrasting, punctuated by a single colour image, of vivid red petals covering the stage as a male dancer cradles two small dogs in his bare arms. The stark, raw humanity and the flowing, abstract nature of these images is an apt addition to Yohji’s magazine – echoing the substance of Pina’s work in a static medium without compromising its impact and aesthetic.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXVuVQuMvgA[/youtube]