Citizens Kane

christophe kane FW1314 via wwd.com

First Gabby Dover was 'blessed by Victoria Beckham', making her international runway debut at Beckham's Victoria, Victoria Beckham show at New York Fashion Week last week, a matter of mere weeks after signing up with Sydney model agency Priscillas. Now Dover has been booked as a London Fashion Week exclusive by one of that city's hottest new designers, Christopher Kane. Only increasing the buzz factor of Kane's camo de luxe show overnight was the fact that last month, he sold a 51 percent stake of his company to French luxury goods conglomerate PPR, the parent of, among other brands, Gucci, Alexander McQueen and Stella McCartney. But there is a connection between the Beckham and Kane shows which could mean even bigger things for Dover - not to mention the four other Australians cast in Kane's show. 

Seventy thousand were nuked in Nagasaki. Now you can buy the T-shirt from Christopher Kane

style.com (L) mushroom cloud over nagasaki/AP via nuclearfiles.org

It has been a few days since frockwriter raised questions about the provenance of the mushroom cloud graphics in Christopher Kane’s Resort 2010 collection. Kane told Style.com the images depicted “nuclear test explosions from the '50s to the '70s” and were sourced from the “free public-access database” of the UK Ministry of Defence.

Frockwriter asked, did Kane require permission for commercial use of the images and if so, had the MOD licensed him to make a nuclear fashion statement? This might prove awkward, we noted, in light of the recent compensation case initiated by 1000 war veterans over radiation exposure incurred during the MOD's 1950s atomic tests.

Although the MOD confirmed a license would be required for the commercial use of its images, the organisation has yet to get back to us with any other information.

Meanwhile, Kane’s sister and business partner, Tammy Kane, told frockwriter there is no link to the Atomic Veterans Group case and that although the graphics were “inspired by the images on the MOD website”, no MOD images were used. The images were sourced, she added, from “more conventional picture sources”, with all necessary consents duly organised.

Why drag the MOD's name into it? No response.

Would she provide the real source? Not a chance.

Noted Tammy Kane, “We don’t intend to reveal the source of the images. We have enough problems with people copying our work without making it even easier for them”.

Unfortunately for the Kanes, you don't need to be a nuclear astrophysicist to track down some of the images. And one of these images has nothing to do with atomic tests.

Page one of a quick Google Image search under the term “mushroom cloud” yields two images which bear uncanny resemblances to those used in at least three garments from the collection.

Most notably, one black and white T-shirt is emblazoned with a mushroom cloud print that shares at least 30 commonalities with - and appears identical to - one of the best-known photographs of WWII (both pictured above ^).

The original image was taken on August 9, 1945, three minutes after the US Air Force dropped a 21 kiloton atomic bomb on the Japanese port town of Nagasaki, killing 40,000 people instantly, with an additional 30,000 estimated to have died from injuries and radiation exposure.

The Nagasaki blast, which prompted Japan’s surrender, came of course three days after an even more devastating US nuclear attack on Hiroshima, which killed 70,000 instantly and an estimated 200,000 within five years.

Here is the original image, credited to the US Air Force via Associated Press:


AP/daylife.com

There are many reproductions of the Nagasaki image online. This one bears the closest resemblance to the image in the Kane print.

Wikimedia claims the photograph is in the public domain because it is a work of a US military or Department of Defense employee, taken/made during the course of an employee's official duties.

Frockwriter is curious just how well the T-shirt will fare in the Japanese market.

There are also many similarities between another historic image - this time taken during the Cold War - and a print on Kane's blue and yellow sheath dress which featured on page one of Style.com last week:


christopher kane Resort 2010/style.com


The striking horizontal band of light in the middle of the cloud, the shapes of the smaller, darker clouds at the base and even the degradation of blues which appears at the top of the original image, depicting a mountain range - and which have been incorporated into the neckline of the dress - are identical.

The original image was taken on June 24th 1957 and shows the detonation of a 37 kiloton bomb called Priscilla at the Nevada Test Site, part of a series of US atomic tests called Operation Plumbob (aka Operation Plijmbbob) which were conducted between May and October that year.

Although in several places online a colourised version of the image is credited to Associated Press, the original source appears to be the United States Department of Energy. Wikimedia credits the photo to the National Nuclear Security Administration – a separate body that was created by US Congress in 2000 within the USDOE.


USDOE via lucente.org


Acording to Wikimedia, this image is also in the public domain in the US.

Over two hundred thousand military personnel, workers and civilians are estimated to have been exposed to radiation as a result of US nuclear activities during WWII and the Cold War – with most of that exposure incurred in and around the Nevada Test Site.

In observance of the US government's role in the immediate, and potential longterm, health impacts of this radiation exposure, a raft of legislation has since been passed by US Congress, including the Veterans’ Dioxin and Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (1984), the Radiation-Exposed Veterans Compensation Act (1988) and the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (1990).

Of his reasons for choosing the mushroom cloud prints for his Resort 2010 collection, Kane told Style.com:

“I wanted something natural, but I'm so fed up with florals”.

Christopher Kane taps the British government to make a nuclear fashion statement

christopher kane Resort 2010/style.com


You may recall the furore over Kate Sylvester’s use of war medals in the styling of her 2008 Rosemount Australian Fashion Show in Sydney. Well frockwriter can’t help wondering if Scottish fashion darling Christopher Kane might be heading down a similar path. Overnight, prominent fashion website style.com gushed over images of Kane’s “first-ever pre-collection” on its homepage, complete with headline, “It’s the bomb”. The collection’s mushroom cloud graphics were sourced, at least according to style.com - which is owned by Condé Nast, calls itself the online home of Vogue and is regarded as an authority, so we must assume that the details are correct - from “free public-access photos” on the UK Ministry of Defence website. Kane told the website, “I wanted something natural, but I'm so fed up with florals. And then I came across these images of nuclear test explosions from the fifties to the seventies on the Internet. I like the crazy-bright chemical colors. The way they're sinister—but beautiful". UPDATE 15/6: SEVENTY THOUSAND WERE NUKED IN NAGASAKI. NOW YOU CAN BUY THE T-SHIRT FROM CHRISTOPHER KANE.



screen grab/style.com

On her collection review, style.com’s senior fashion critic, Sarah Mower, a Brit, makes the following quip:

“The dresses in Christopher Kane's first-ever pre-collection radiate instant-appeal commerciality in just enough of a subversive way to be interesting”.

christopher kane Resort 2010/style.com


There are potentially several problems with this. It is interesting that noone sought to clarify the details.

Firstly, if you decide to use images of nuclear testing to make some kind of artistic or political statement, why not get a designer to conjure up exclusive graphics? Kane makes no mention of a political statement, simply that he was jack of florals.

Secondly, there’s the issue of copyright. Here are the MOD's terms and conditions for the use of the images in its database:

“The material featured on this website is subject to Crown Copyright protection unless otherwise indicated. The material may be downloaded to file or printer for the purposes of non-commercial research and private study.

Any other proposed use of the material is subject to a copyright licence available from the Ministry of Defence in accordance with standard Crown Copyright licensing policy”.

Frockwriter was unable to locate the images which Kane claims to have used for the graphics in the MOD database. It's unclear if, due to the time frame, any British government images from the 1950s would be considered public domain.

Did Kane seek permission to use the images for commercial purposes or was he just "inspired" by them, in the same way that Shepherd Fairey was directly inspired by an Associated Press image of Barack Obama for Fairey's iconic HOPE poster of the 2008 US presidential campaign? The case became mired in controversy.

In the extremely unlikely scenario that the MOD in fact licensed Kane to reproduce military imagery to make nuclear war a fashion statement, a number of people would most likely have issues with this.

Starting with the Atomic Veterans Group: 1000 British, New Zealand, Fijian and Australian war veterans who, just last Friday, won a five-year battle to sue the British government for compensation over a raft of health problems which they claim are the direct result of exposure to radiation during the government’s atomic tests in the South Pacific and Australia between 1952 and 1958.

Although the majority of the group is British, it includes 200 New Zealanders, 180 Fijians and approximately 30 Australians.

The retired servicemen were among 25,000 forces who were exposed to the tests. Air and naval servicemen were, reportedly, ordered to pass close to the testing, with ground forces provided with scant protection.

Earlier hearings concluded that the British government and military administration of the day had withheld information about the dangers of the testing.

Don James, who was stationed on Christmas island during five tests in 1958, told The Guardian on Friday:

"We had no special kit. They just told us to turn your back to the blast and cover your eyes. You could see the bones in your fingers."

Friday’s High Court ruling has also greenlit the compensation claims of hundreds of other Australian, New Zealand and Fijian war veterans who participated in the testing program.

Update 11.00pm: Comment is being sought from both Kane and the UK Ministry of Defence, the latter nevertheless confirming that a license would definitely be required for use of the images. The MOD is looking into whether or not this was obtained by Kane.

Neil Sampson, a partner of the London-based Rosenblatt Solicitors, who has led the Atomic Veterans Group case, said he would be "astounded" to learn that the MOD licensed the images to Kane - or that Kane's use of the atomic test images at this time was coincidental.

"In June 2009, when the UK Ministry of Defence's role in the development of atomic warfare is on the front pages of newspapers throughout the world, it seems a little cynical" Sampson told frockwriter. "But I could ask, since when has advertising not been cynical and opportunistic?"

Kane and able

Word first leaked on Friday that Brit enfant terrible Christopher Kane (above, pictured with Donatelle Versace) has been involved in a collab project with Versace's 20 year-old diffusion line Versus, which is being relaunched after a four year hiatus. Yesterday the spectacular, crystal-encrusted accessories collection was unveiled in Milan and here are a couple of shots, courtesy Versace.



This is not the first time Kane has worked with Versace.

Prior to the September 2006 launch of his own signature collection in London, the St Martins graduate briefly consulted to Versace's Atelier haute couture line and the accessories line.

Given how closely-guarded the Kane intel was, you have to wonder how much more of an involvement he may have in the Versus fashion collection, which will bow at the Spring 2010 shows in September.

Or indeed, whether there may be anything in the pipeline with another Versace protege, Norwegian Kristian Aadnevik.



All images: Versace.