John Galliano to Teach at Parsons

[71000]

Parsons has announced it will be offering a new master class taught by John Galliano, confirming earlier Fashionista reports.

According to Lucky, seniors in Parsons’s BFA fashion program received an email this weekend about a new course titled “Show Me Emotion.” The course description reads: “‘SHOW ME EMOTION!’ seeks to engage its participants by provoking the power of emotion in context of fashion practice and exploration of intuitive, perceptive manners of investigational making.” The three-day workshop will be taught by Galliano and the final critique will reportedly be given by Galliano and Parsons Dean Simon Collins.

Earlier this month, Collins told us that he “loves John Galliano” and intimated he’d be welcome to teach there. We also heard from a reliable source that Galliano was headed to teach at Parsons. At the time, Parsons refused to comment.

This marks Galliano’s second major gig in the fashion industry following his antisemitic tirade and subsequent ousting as the creative director at Dior. At Anna Wintour’s behest, and after putting in time with the Anti-Defamation League, Galliano was an “artist in residence” of sorts at Oscar de la Renta’s studio for the three weeks preceding de la Renta’s fall show. His influence could be seen in the styling of de la Renta’s show and was met with critical acclaim. But Galliano’s presence in New York elicited a backlash after he was captured on the cover of the New York Post, just a day after de la Renta’s show, in what looked like Hasidic garb.

How New Yorkers will react to Galliano’s new Parsons gig remains to be seen. Early reaction to the news on Twitter seem positive. Crystal Gibson (‏@CrystalGibson) tweeted, “Whatever John Galliano is teaching at Parsons, enrol [sic] me.” Brenda Knight (‏@BrendaKnightt) wrote “I wish I could go back to school again!!!” Others have been more reluctant to embrace the news. Emily (‏ @emmahcodee) wrote “It’s confirmed that Galliano’s teaching at Parsons. Courses will include Anti-Semitism 101 & Intro to doing coke lines off a dress form.” Another user, Veronica Amarante ‏(@RefinedPursuit) wrote “Those who can’t do, teach.”

We’ve reached out to reps for Parsons and Galliano and will update when we hear back.

UPDATE: Dis has published the full letter Parsons sent out to students regarding the course.

Regarding Galliano it says:

A master of tailoring, construction, research, and thematic investigation, John Galliano is an unparalleled living legend capable of blending and blurring the traditional boundaries of practice. A technical genius, after more than twenty-five years of practice, what inspires him most today is not a destination of a geographical sense but the divergent journeys of the soul,mind, and reflection. Feeling, thinking, perceiving, and responding shape his current creative identity and he allows emotion to determine the depth of a collar, the volume between body and sleeve.

It goes on to say that student will “be encouraged to engage with Galliano in all aspects of the creative process including the intense pressure of sustainable a role at the very top of the design world.”

fashionista.com

Some of those tweeters are idiots. Jesus Christ, the whole fiasco was years ago and he's already apologized and paid the consequence of his actions. He hasn't stepped out of line since, yet people continue to hold one drunken mistake against him And Veronica Amarante would be hard pressed to find another professor as qualified and talented as one of the greatest couturiers of all time. Anyway, I'm really happy that he's making his way back to fashion, although this is far from what I really want to see him doing. But, baby steps...

 

[curlycue]

Parsons is lucky to have a premier couturier teach and coach thier students. It's bound to add to Parsons prestige and acclaim as a top design school. I, too, am a huge Galliano fan and am glad to see him coming back.

Dear Lord, forgive the man. He's obviously made his amends. Let him move on with pursuing his craft.

 

[Golden ice]

He said something had when he was drunk... so we should exile him from the fashion world and not let him teach even though he is an amazing designer?

People need to get over themselves - they need to stop being overly sensitive.

 

[Anna]

He said something had when he was drunk... so we should exile him from the fashion world and not let him teach even though he is an amazing designer?

People need to get over themselves - they need to stop being overly sensitive.

To be fair, people are most honest and truthful about their real opinion when they're drunk...

I don't think Galliano is more racist than most people in the fashion industry though, since there is a lot more diversity in the models he chooses vs people in the industry who only think other ethnic groups should portray just one stereotype. It's just that saying, "Oh don't be so sensitive, he was drunk, get over it..." to racist remarks is very bad IMO. The more we excuse people so easily, the more acceptable and ingrained in our culture racism becomes.

I do feel that there were other factors behind the whole thing at Dior though, which I won't get into because that would be going way too off topic.

Anyway, I wonder how the course will turn out to be, haha, I know a student at Parsons and he doesn't even do fashion but was excited/showing off about this.

 

[71000]

To be fair, people are most honest and truthful about their real opinion when they're drunk...

I don't think Galliano is more racist than most people in the fashion industry though, since there is a lot more diversity in the models he chooses vs people in the industry who only think other ethnic groups should portray just one stereotype. It's just that saying, "Oh don't be so sensitive, he was drunk, get over it..." to racist remarks is very bad IMO. The more we excuse people so easily, the more acceptable and ingrained in our culture racism becomes.

Except he wasn't excused easily. Besides facing enormous public ridicule because he's so famous, he had to leave Dior and his eponymous fashion label (which is even more terrible than being fired from Dior, because now he cannot ever make a new house using the same name). He was charged, had to pay a fine, and was even stripped of the legion of honor. Yet even after he received mental help and has obviously repented for his actions, unforgiving dumbasses still want him to suffer. Everyone makes mistakes, and tons of people say racist remarks without having to go through what Galliano had to go through. All he did was say a few offensive remarks, which seems trivial in comparison to some of the degrading things people post online. It was just his bad luck that he was in France and not somewhere like the US. Plus, it's not like his racist remark was unprovoked, and it's easy to say things you don't mean when you're drunk and someone insults you. The fact that people still want him to suffer for a small mistake made long ago disgusts me and shows how lack of empathy is acceptable and ingrained in our culture.

OT, but my school is doing Beauty and the Beast, and sometimes when I think of Galliano, these lyrics from Beast's soliloquy come to mind
"How long much this go on, this cruel trick of fate, I simply made one careless, wrong decision"

 

[Anna]

Except he wasn't excused easily.

Yeah I agree he wasn't, I was referring to other cases where people's racist remarks and attitude are really easily dismissed having a negative influence on what's deemed acceptable by society.

The fact that people still want him to suffer for a small mistake made long ago disgusts me and shows how lack of empathy is acceptable and ingrained in our culture.

I think there were other problems people had against Galliano, maybe, and some people say Dior had other hidden reasons for wanting to fire him?!
I also find it annoying that Galliano is seen to be such an outlier for saying something racist when there is a lot of racial discrimination and stereotyping from others in the industry (plenty or editorials and runway shows reflect this ).