The third layer primarily deals with the construction of identity based on gender and sexual preference, and is closely related to Quentin Crisp, whose character is of enormous relevance to the art piece’s message despite the fact that he only appears explicitly in the music video. Having already made the acquaintance of Crisp in 1985 during the filming of The Bride, Sting and he met several times in New York over the course of the production of “… Nothing like the sun” (Erwe 2011). One really has to take a second look to recognize that the elder person with long grey hair and in woman’s clothes is actually Quentin Crisp, who regularly partakes in cross-dressing. Interestingly, the presence of Crisp, an Englishman himself and among the first
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As Davis (1992: 5) argues, fashion itself serves as a context- dependent code, meaning that what is signified by a certain choice of clothing, make-up, and hairstyle is met with different responses depending on the audience and period. Furthermore, as Crane (2000: 3) adds, clothing “performs a major role in the social construction of identity” and, what is particularly interesting for this analysis, allows the individual to create and play out a meaningful self-identity (Giddens 1991). But the impact of clothing also extends to the realm of social and cultural fields of tension. Not only do consumers use “fashion discourses to forge self-defining social distinctions and boundaries to construct narratives of personal history” (Thompson and Haytko 1997:16), but also, and most importantly, to “transform and […] contest conventional social categories” (ibid.). It has exactly this impact, to contest conventional and social categories, when Crisp, a biological male, enters the public sphere in women’s clothes and thereby not only questions but also challenges the norm and social expectations of what is considered appropriate. Additionally, Hebdige (1979: 2) attributes “the status and meaning of revolt, the idea of style as a form of Refusal” to clothing. The fact that even today “hegemonic ideals of appropriate gender behaviour and appearance still remain very different for each gender” (Crane 2000: 16) underpins the amount of courage Crips has shown in the far more conservative society in the
As Davis (1992: 5) argues, fashion itself serves as a context- dependent code, meaning that what is signified by a certain choice of clothing, make-up, and hairstyle is met with different responses depending on the audience and period. Furthermore, as Crane (2000: 3) adds, clothing “performs a major role in the social construction of identity” and, what is particularly interesting for this analysis, allows the individual to create and play out a meaningful self-identity (Giddens 1991). But the impact of clothing also extends to the realm of social and cultural fields of tension. Not only do consumers use “fashion discourses to forge self-defining social distinctions and boundaries to construct narratives of personal history” (Thompson and Haytko 1997:16), but also, and most importantly, to “transform and […] contest conventional social categories” (ibid.). It has exactly this impact, to contest conventional and social categories, when Crisp, a biological male, enters the public sphere in women’s clothes and thereby not only questions but also challenges the norm and social expectations of what is considered appropriate. Additionally, Hebdige (1979: 2) attributes “the status and meaning of revolt, the idea of style as a form of Refusal” to clothing. The fact that even today “hegemonic ideals of appropriate gender behaviour and appearance still remain very different for each gender” (Crane 2000: 16) underpins the amount of courage Crips has shown in the far more conservative society in the