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Vice Blog

GDR FASHION TSAR

Amongst the paranoia and dirth of fresh fruit in communist East Germany there lived a small, but vibrant group of fashion visionaries, who endeavored to keep the torch of individuality burning in the shadow of a State controlled media.

During this time a young man named Marco Wilms began his first forays into the fashion world as a card carrying dressman (the GDR term for model), working for the country's Fashion Institute in East Berlin. After the capitalist system annexed the GDR at the end of the 80s, Wilms opted out of fashion and spent a decade in the wilderness before returning as a filmmaker. In late 2009 he celebrated the release of his first feature film, Comrade Couture, revealing the secrets of the East German fashion scene by focusing on its two main protagonist movements, "Chic, Charmant, und Dauerhaft" and "Allerleirauh." Among others, the film features designer Sabine von Oettingen, the first to use the eponymous strawberry foil in her outfits (the foil was also used on body bags), avant-garde photographer Robert Paris, and extravagant hairdresser/stylist Frank Schäfer, who was constantly harassed and arrested by the Stasi due to his glittering pink hairstyles. It's a real romp.

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Currently Wilms divides his time between Berlin and Thailand, where he teaches film at Thammasat University, and is working on a new film about Peter Weibel, the Viennese performance artist. We caught up with him during a short sojourn in Berlin, where he still resides in the same house he squatted back in 1989.

Vice: Hello, Marco Wilms. First off, I have to say that while watching Comrade Couture I got the feeling that fashion is only the surface of what's happening in the film. It seemed far more about social and political ideas, rather than high-heels and crimped perms.
Marco: It's about a feeling. I wanted to remember the values of my youth. I grew up in a dictatorship and I developed a set of very distinct values that were part of my lifestyle.

How did that manifest itself exactly?
GDR society wanted you to become part of a collective. It was about being well-behaved, to function and to do what communist society needed, we thought that was absurd and we were against it. We wanted to find our own truth. It was about questioning the regime. What is the reason for living? Where is the intensity? All of that encouraged us to be really offensive. Not that we wanted to start an armed resistance, we just wanted to be ourselves. We wanted a sensual, exciting, and exalted life. That's why we put on the fashion shows. Those shows and clothes were a way of provoking the GDR in a way that wouldn't be possible today.

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So showing fashion or wearing different kinds of clothes was seen as a "danger" to society?
In the film, Frank Schäfer tells this story about how he was constantly arrested because he had glitter spray in his hair or had it dyed pink. That was pure provocation. But it was fun, we were looking for trouble. Also, it wasn't a total military dictatorship. There were laws, they could hold you for a few hours but couldn't put you in jail forever. You could leave after an hour and tell it to your buddies. The Stasi didn't classify punks as public enemy number one for nothing. They were a lot less dangerous than other people, they weren't that political but they were very noticeable, they didn't want to be well behaved and that annoyed the old men. In their eyes we provided a bad example for the free youth of Germany, marching unison and being the combatants for the Party. We didn't want to be combatants for the Party.

I can understand that. Do you think that you and the groups in the movie could be considered punk?
The movie is about Chic, Charmant, and Dauerhaft, and Allerleirauh, who performed their fashion shows. They might have understood themselves as punks, but they were more fashion punks. I was five years younger and looked up to those people; I was more of a fan. We didn't want to be part of another club, we wanted to be individual. We created our own style that we could identify with. It changed, too, sometimes I was a punk or a bit more pop. It was postmodern. East Berlin Postmodernism, I would call it.

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Sounds about right. The fashion that the groups created and that you showed was quite extreme. Was it made to wear or was it just about the performance?
Haha, that's a pretty capitalistic question. It wasn't about creating something useful, it was about creating your own world. There was a limited range of goods; if you had "West money" you might've been able to buy a pair of Levi's at Intershop. But if you wanted something crazy or something especially beautiful you had to make it yourself. And they did that. They created their own worlds. It started with their cars, they only drove old-timers. Then it was the places where the shows took place, like churches or an abandoned swimming pool. A show lasted for two days. There were 100 costumes, 120 performers--they had worked on the clothes for nine months. It was all about this particular lifestyle. The sewing and the hanging out and the drinking and partying and having sex--it was all part of it. It wasn't just the show. It was about staging this life we lead and staging this world. It was an escape from GDR reality. It was great to live like that for a while, but everybody who got older left the country. You could only exist in that niche up to a certain point. It was the same for almost anybody. I think everybody I showed in the movie left.

They all left before the wall fell?
Yes, one friend of mine left two days before. Nobody knew what was going to happen. It wasn't obvious for us that the wall would fall.

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How was life there? Everything must have been terribly static.
It was as quiet as a cemetery in that country. It was a frozen society that was governed by a group of old men who didn't know shit about the youth and lived in their own time bubble. We wanted to escape. I always wondered why nobody else did the same thing, because literally everything was limited. Every form of individuality or spontaneous act was demonized. People that came to the shows and celebrated with us were so thankful and happy. It was a release for them.
It must've been a huge thing to put on shows like that. Was the establishment in any way influenced by what you did and was there a way to become part of what happened in '89?
No, and that is tragic. Allerleirauh could have been a figurehead in the reunification, but nobody wanted that. GDR designers and all the important creative people didn't realize that they were avant-garde. The West understood, there was a big article in Stern on Allerleirauh. But I don't think the members wanted it either. They could've been involved in what the country looks like right now. But most artists and intellectuals were in a niche, because nobody wanted to have anything to do with the system. The change happened so fast, it happened in a landslide--whoops and the country was gone. It wasn't a reunification, it was a takeover. The masses who wanted to consume chose the easiest path. They were sick of socialism. Either you were a dissident and you had to leave the country or you were in a niche from where you couldn't lead or redesign a country. That still sickens people, the fact that intellectuals and artists weren't included it that process.

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Was there some sort of movement between the establishment and the counterculture?
Yes, of course. Most models worked for the governmental designers and the Institute of Fashion. Frank Schäfer did the Makeup for all of the GDR fashion movies. But the established people were afraid to hang out with us. They came to the exhibitions and were complaining about details in the linings. As if it was about that! It was a dictatorship of the petty bourgeoisie. We had to rebel against that.

You definitely did. Frank Schäfer, who is in your movie, was a really extravagant person, right? He walked around in drag and wore provocative makeup. How was that received? Did people understand him?
He suffered. He was way to queer for the gay scene in the GDR. It was great for him to come to West Berlin because he had lots of sex. He was a real colorful specimen in the GDR, probably the most colorful one in East Berlin. But, like many others, there came a time when he had had enough. Since then he has led a very down to earth life. He is a hairdresser, he opens his shop six days a week at nine in the morning. But he still looks eccentric. It's interesting that the GDR was more tolerant regarding sexual orientation than this country is. Take nudism, that's almost scandalous today. It was totally normal in the GDR. There is a fashion show at a nude beach in the movie.

But nudism is de-sexualized and it seems to me as if it had been the same in the gay community, sex seemed to have been outside of the discourse. There was no discrimination but there weren't any words for it either, right?
There were quite a few gay bars. I'm not gay myself, but I had lots of friends in the scene. That helped me to get out of the army. They classified me as a psychologically damaged specimen with homosexual tendencies, so the NVA didn't want me anymore.

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Apparently that was similar in the West. My dad tells this story about a gay guy in his army troop who was dishonorably discharged.
Haha, I'm a squatter and it was a big shock for me when we clashed with the West Berlin scene, because these people were so radical in their sexuality and their gender politics. I didn't know that from the GDR, because we partied together all the time and we had sex afterward. You just tried to get the one that looked the prettiest and to convince him that you are the best. There was no such thing as gender war, we felt equal to women. The society that came afterward was way less developed.

Did you become a model because you were connected to the fashion scene?
No, the modeling was the start, that was how I met the people, I was discovered in a Friedrichshagen discotheque. I wore this torero jacket I made myself with the lining hanging out. I must have been kind of exceptional in this suburban disco, so the model scout of the Institute of Fashion spotted me and started talking to me.

How old were you?
I must have been 24. The Institute of Fashion was always looking for intellectual types. A lot of the models were actually mathematicians or photographers. They believed that fashion was part of culture, and the models should reflect that. It was a completely different approach than in the West, where it was about catching a trend and reaching a target audience.

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You said that you wanted to become a model because you wanted to create art. Was it art for you or was it a step into the fashion and art scene?
That was pretty ambivalent. I wasn't a really good model, I couldn't really walk, but I liked beauty and being surrounded by people that were selected due to their bodily charisma. It was about sexuality, we had lots of sex. I was annoyed of being the clothes rack for the Institute of Fashion. It was not intellectually challenging enough.
Were you recognized on the street?
No, it was actually kind of embarrassing for us to be a model. The GDR was a country of farmers and workers. Now, every teenager wants to be a model. They want to become famous by doing nothing. Something like that didn't happen in a country where work was the most important thing. To earn money with your looks was kind of objectionable, we were a bit decadent.

Do you think it's sad that fashion changed so much? Do you think that it has a diminished influence or do you think that its potential still exists and it's about to change again?
It's no longer black and white. Fashion can still be subversive. The jacket that I'm wearing was made by this young Uzbek designer--I bought it straight from the catwalk, because it reminded me of Allerleirauh.

Yes, that's what I thought as well.
Yeah, people permanently ask me about that jacket and everybody wants to touch it. You can still communicate with your clothes but the political statement is missing. Society is too liberal for that.

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Do you still find subjects that are interesting to work on in this liberal society?
Yes, of course. At the moment I'm making a movie about Peter Weibel, he is this really interesting performance artist from Viennese Actionism. He is a great thinker and a mastermind of our time, really. He had a really touching childhood. He was a fugitive from Odessa as a kid, his mum put him in a children's home because she was overwhelmed. I think that from this lonely and hard childhood a genius has emerged.

Sounds like an interesting guy. What's your connection to Thailand?
Thailand is my second home. When I was a student I did the sound for a film there. I immediately liked Asia and Buddhist culture, the women and the lifestyle. It never left me. I later made this movie about the Thai king's dog. The dog has its own royal title and he serves as a role model for the whole society. Because of all his positive characteristics the king wrote a book about him and published photos. I thought that was really fascinating, that a king edifies his people using a dog. It's so antique. The movie is called Thai Canine Heroes.

Thailand is still a constitutional monarchy, right?
Yes, there is a big-scale societal conflict in Thailand. The king, who is a pretty positive integrative force that mended the societal conflicts is in the hospital now though. He is really old and very sick. It's the end of an era and all of these conflicts are breaking open. There is a huge gap between people who own something, and people who don't.

Did you catch any of the riots?
Yes, although I hang out at a pretty elitist place with Arabian horses galloping along the beach. You can go horseback riding and there are great restaurants there. People are doing too well to be political. It's a place to relax. But in the shop where I buy my water they had the demonstrations on TV 24/7 on top volume. The owner is probably a Red Shirt sympathizer. It's really interesting to see what's going to happen here.

When the Yellow Shirts demonstrated last year it was especially fascinating because the people where not the establishment but rather the establishment's help. Do you somehow recognize this from the situation in the GDR?
It's still hard to analyze or understand this phenomenon using our values. It's a fact that there is a societal conflict between elitists that held power for hundreds of years in something that is a feudal system, really. The system helps the rich. The guy who tried to help the part of the population that isn't so well off, and tried to provide them with more influence and money was Thaksin. He was prime minister but also the richest man in Thailand and he was completely corrupt. He involved his family in everything and used his position to gain personal profits. But the people don't care, they are still his fans and he is still the movement's leader. The elitists have to move over and say, "OK, we'll change those feudal privileges and give something back." It's high time.

Comrade Couture is out right now on DVD and on the festival circuit with stops in Istanbul, Arizona, Buenos Aires and at the MOMA in New York. Find out more at twitter.com/comradecouture.

INTERVIEW: STEFAN LAUER

PORTRAIT: LIZE VAN SCHOOR