THEWomen’s bodies always at the centre. When architect Bernard Rudofsky wrote in the 1970s The unfinished body, analyzed how nudity was now seen as “incomplete”: for example, what could be the ancient and modern reasons that pushed women to exhibit themselves, among ornaments and clothing, as producers of erotic charm? «Only in rare moments of clarity are we able to observe with amazement all the outrages that we are capable of perpetrating against our body» explained Rudofsky himself.
Today, for many women, enclosing their shapes in standardized clothing insinuates into the concept of “sizes” the same fear as those placed on the heads of thieves of other times: like outlaws, Should even supposedly “outsized” people think about hiding?
The new enters (philosophically) into the shoes of the body and fashion podcasts Sailor. Body anatomy through fashion by (and with) Maria Luisa Frisa and Chiara Tagliaferri: track one new geography of bodies in which, at each episodea different anatomical part is associated with the work of very famous stylists, interviewed by the two authors (on Storielibere.fm and on all listening platforms).
Bustiers and restrictive clothing haven’t disappeared, “they’ve simply become internalized through diet, exercise and plastic surgery,” says fashion historian and curator Valerie Steele. (Getty Images)
Women’s bodies: where to start
The first episode was dedicated to the chest, interpreted in a dialogue with Maria Grazia Chiuri, creative director of Dior. «Women don’t understand how mannequins, i.e. abstract bodies, go on the catwalk» introduces Maria Luisa Frisa, famous fashion theorist, teacher, author and curator. «But size is no longer a reference, on the contrary: we should see her as a liberation!
We often forget that it allowed us to enjoy fashion as we experience it today, democratic, and not just with the “tailor-made” past of couture. Of course, the fault also lies with those who continue to propose examples of how to dress “after 50 or 60”. How to do the hairstyle that makes you look younger, or that makes your face thinner. It means placing more and more limits on physique and age. Everyone should be able to dress in their own style, forever! Certainly not something new, one would think if we think back to the first major Hollywood studios which already at the time were modifying the faces of actresses by creating stars on the spot, even removing their molars to make their faces more hollow.
As explained by research conducted by StileoItaly’s leading fashion search engine with over seven million visits per month, investigating Many uncertainties emerge among Italian users regarding physicality and relationship with fashion beauty standards. If more than a third of those interviewed admit to feeling overweight, as many as 45 percent confess to having purchased smaller clothes with the aim of losing weight and wearing them later. During the shopping experience, 32 percent of women feel insecure about their bodies.
The part that causes the most discomfort? Almost 50 percent of women and men confirm that the belly generates more insecurities. We discuss it with Jader Tolja, doctor, psychotherapist and researcher dedicated to the study of relationships between physical, mental and cultural changes, as well as the author (with Nelleke Don) of Body, fashion, mind. Think about dressing from the point of view of the body (The Meeting Point).
Shoes in focus: volume Body, Fashion, Mind explains how every constriction of the movement of the feet leads to a corresponding limitation in the rest of the body, in turn determining our mental characteristics (Getty Images).
Who dictates the standards of women’s bodies?
Looking at women who are perhaps slightly more rounded, but still beautiful, we often hear: “She has a few extra kilos”: But the spontaneous question we should ask ourselves is: “”More than what?”.
This is enough to illustrate the mental vision of oneself and others that has dominated the cultural scene in recent decades. A vision characterized by the inability to see the person in his complexity and originality, but only to the extent that he adheres to, or deviates from, a single stereotyped ideal. Believing in this ideal implies that we unconsciously stick to a single, arbitrary, evaluation criterion considered absolute. But let’s say that weight is truly an absolute evaluation parameter, talking about ‘ideal weight’ would still make no sense.
Why?
How can we think that the most functional weight for people with different work, family and emotional situations could be the same? Our body is the most complex organism in the known universe and self-regulates in an extremely sophisticated way. Each individual’s weight is the result of the combination of their history and a series of different needs. Believing that we know better than our body how much we should weigh is naive. If there really is an ideal weight, it’s the one we have right now.
On the one hand we know that certain types of men “evaluate” women based on their physical appearance, but in other ways it seems that women’s view of their bodies is even more categorical than men’s.
Those who have less power tend to adopt the point of view of those who do have power. The woman tends to devalue what she feels to look at herself with a male gaze where she is less emancipated. But it would be more correct to say ‘with what you believe to be the male gaze’, because, as you rightly said, you are even more categorical in your assessments of her. Statistically, in the West women perceive themselves as overweight, but this is a perception that does not correspond to that of men, which is much more varied.
A society that induces many women to care so much about their appearance creates a detachment between body and mind: when these two universes are distant, however, the risk of somatization increases…
The main cultural terrain on which diseases develop is the distance between what we believe we are (self) and what we really are (self). That is, between the mind and the body. This distance leads to chronic stress that depresses the immune system and which consumes the organism. The way of dressing has a key role in all of this because it can create tensions and impediments that do not allow a person to be themselves, just as it can free her body and allow her to feel it by helping her to know who she is.
The part dedicated to the belly in your book is very interesting: what are the consequences of the ideal of the perfect belly?
To have a flat stomach, you need to block the diaphragm in the inhalation position and emphasize thoracic breathing, which is more linked to effort and will, to the detriment of abdominal breathing, which is instead linked to calm, serenity, pleasure and the here and now. This limits our emotional life and creates the conditions for a condition of chronic anxiety, given that anxiety, from a physical point of view, is simply an interruption of breathing. Clothing that tightens at the waist or at the pelvic level prevents breath from reaching the pelvic floor and causes suffering to the organs contained therein.
Are we the ones who adapt to the clothes, or the dress that adapts to us? Many brands have decreased the value of sizes over time, a phenomenon known as vanity sizingto increase customers’ self-esteem (and purchases) (Getty Images).
In the book you quote Alain de Botton on the fact that “… for an ideology to become dominant, it cannot be imposed, but must be spread throughout society like a sort of odorless gas”. Do you believe that the relationship with the body has also been modified by society in such a subtle way?
Inevitably. The body perceives what is authentic and what is not. The mind isolated from the body is easily plagiarized by the ideologies of the moment, but if it is linked to the body by proprioception and is based on bodily sensations to understand (thinking with the body), a very efficient alliance is formed between truth and intelligence, which makes those uncomfortable. has an interest in this not happening. One of the motivations that led us to create the book was precisely the possibility of telling what is taken for granted regarding the body and clothing, but which is only taken for granted in our minds, not in reality.
Why is the part of the book dedicated to feet and shoes richer than the others?
All the complex movements of a puppet are controlled from above with a wooden cross, the balance, to which nine strings are generally connected. Something similar happens in humans, except that the movements are controlled from below: the whole body adapts to what the feet detect, which become the equivalent of the scale, while the myofascial meridians are the wires. In the appendix of the book we report some practical experiences that allow us to verify how even short and targeted movements at the level of the feet free similar movements at the level of the neck. Conversely, any limitation of the movement of the feet entails a corresponding limitation in the rest of the body, and this in turn determines our mental characteristics.
How could we summarize-explain the effects on the psyche resulting from the way people act on the body through clothing?
Our psychic qualities do not mature on their own inside the skull, but are a direct expression of a corresponding maturation of movement programs at a bodily level. The predisposition to feel, think and act, for example
example, it is closely linked to the use of different types of muscles, in this case respectively the rotators, the abductors and adductors, and the flexors and extensors. Therefore, every impediment to physical movement involves a limitation of our psychic potential, just as every time we free movement at the level of the body or feet we recover or improve corresponding psycho-emotional qualities.
In your opinion, what could be a future scenario of elaboration-transformation of the body-fashion relationship?
In the modern history of fashion, the mind has always taken advantage of the lack of perception of the body and the profound ignorance of anatomy and physiology to assert its visions. Now things are changing and we have reason to think that a sort of Copernican revolution is underway: the mind will no longer be at the center of the fashion universe, with the body suffering to adapt to its abstractions, but at the center there will be precisely this , that is, what we really are. The great success of the film Barbie testifies precisely to this process. As the well-known doctor and psychotherapist Alexander Lowen says, “People have lost their bodies and they want it back.”
How much has the advent of social media changed or worsened the relationship between women and their bodies?
In every person there is the felt body and the seen body. If one prevails, the other loses importance. In an evening of meditation or yoga the felt body has more space, in a visit to social media the seen body benefits. But I also think that cause and effect need to switch places. I mean that those who have less knowledge and perception of their body are more attracted to social media than those who prefer to navigate their bodies rather than the internet. Then it is natural that a vicious circle is created: the less I feel the body, the more I turn my attention out, the more I turn my attention out, the less I feel the body.
How do we get out of this vicious circle?
When we start from the mental and the visual, we make comparisons and judge: if we don’t like a part of our body, we stop breathing in it, and when we don’t breathe in it it becomes lax or contracts. Both laxity and tension impede feeling. If, however, we reverse the sequence and start from feeling, a virtuous circle is created. This is the reason for the growing success of practices based on proprioception, that is, listening to the body from the inside. Those who are busy feeling do not judge, but enjoy the progressive reconquest of their body with each wave of breath. This is what transforms us: if we peek into a room where meditation or any practice in which attention is focused inward is performed, we realize that the people are beautiful. All.
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