French Visual Artists, Young Emperors On Their Approach To Genderless Fashion
WITH YOUNG EMPERORS
The team spirit they reference comes from their oneness of mind. It’s about finding someone who you can “let into your creative space” since it can “change your ground” in the words of Nelson.
Photography, Daniel D’Ottavio
Words, Caleb Church In Conversation with Young Emperors
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Bright and early, the French adorned voices of Isabelle Chaput and Nelson Tiberghein came whizzing through the air. Both co-founders of the increasingly popular social empire Young Emperors, they tout themselves as artists whose practice spans the bounds of fashion, and performance art. Now renowned for their playful exploration of androgyny and short-form storytelling, we’re left to wonder how we mere mortals can achieve the same level of very-well-thought-out-but-easy-like-you-just-woke-up-and-threw-something-on fabulousness.
Contrary to popular belief, however, sometimes even angels have relatable stories, and for that, I start with Isabelle. Isabelle found her way into Nelson’s life through a feeling we can all relate to – Uncertainty.
She studied photojournalism and Political Science because she felt her parents would view it more seriously. During that time, she blessed Rome for a year with her humble passion and started working lights in a theater before moving on to work on her first short film. It was at that moment that she realized she needed to be an artist and didn’t need to go through another journey that led back to the same realization. Upon returning home, she dived headfirst into art school, gaining some experience before specializing in photography.
ultimately male and female gender won’t exist anymore as we know it.
THE LOOK
Plaid Jacket, Sandro
Nelson, in his quiet air of mountain-like confidence, pursued a slightly more straightforward path; although similar. Also starting out in photojournalism, he became aware quickly that his real love was for photography itself, and not journalism at all. With that epiphany, he tried out for the Gobelins School of Visual communication and Arts and succeeded.
At Gobelins L’Ecole De L’image, they fell in love.
Some years later, Young Emperors was born. It was inspired by what they call “the team spirit of love”. At the time they were very interested in Korean and Japanese culture. Matching outfits were worn as an expression of their love across all areas of life. For them, it was a way to complete that “team spirit” and bring them together.
The team spirit they reference comes from their oneness of mind. It’s about finding someone who you can “let into your creative space” since it can “change your ground” in the words of Nelson. Isabelle highlights that everything they do comes from love and their want to be a part of something other than themselves – a stark contrast to the individualistic state of New York.
One thing above all stood out – Their passion and genuine love for their art.
THE LOOK
Shirt, Teddy Vonranson; Vegan Leather Dress, Nanushka
BO: Knowing that you like to play with androgyny in your fashion, what does gender mean to you?
Nelson: Your identity.
Isabelle: Your identity is a good way to put it. Yeah. This question deserves nuanced answers. And I say answers on purpose because it is really personal first of all, but you also have to take into account that multiple social constructs have been put into that word. So, it’s ever-changing from every perspective through culture, morals, or religious values that can be in place. I think as you said [Nelson] very well, it's a personal identity.
economically speaking, it would be very good to open up the market to men who’ve been so barricaded as to what they can wear.
THE LOOK
Plaid Jacket, Sandro
BO: How do you think fashion is going to ultimately adapt to changing gender norms in society.
Nelson: I think ultimately male and female gender won’t exist anymore as we know it. On a personal side, it’s already pointless to say menswear and womenswear are separate. You can pick what you want where you want as humans. I think fashion will follow this path. It’s what the younger generation is doing. So it only makes sense that it will follow this path.
Isabelle: The younger generation is already sharing our mentality that is your dress however you want to adorn your body. I think a lot of times, gender constructs have been very connected to economic purposes. We think that economically speaking, it would be very good to open up the market to men who’ve been so barricaded as to what they can wear.
BO: As fashion is a form of self-expression, what does self-expression mean to you? What do you try to say through your styles?
Nelson: For style, we don’t really try to say anything. It’s about your own personality. I don’t really try to put a message into what I’m wearing. I choose clothes for myself before anything else. For Instagram of course it’s case by case. Some content we’ll talk about a subject like gender neutrality, and sometimes we just like to have fun.
Isabelle: So it’s always these little vignettes. Sometimes it’s styling, sometimes it’s a strong message, sometimes it’s a joke, and sometimes it’s even linking history to fashion. We saw this trend a lot where people were tying a rope around the ankle of pants and it reminded us of the Gauls in the Roman empire. So we talk about that too. Every style inspires us to talk about something. I’d say it’s a mix between our eccentricity and also our more classic style from France.
BO: If we took away the actual labels of Men’s v.s. Women’s, how do we then begin to describe the stylistic attributes of those clothes.
Isabelle: There’s no need to change labels, there’s only a need to change mentalities about it. If something is pink, then some people will assume it’s not for men. The problem is there, not within the name. It links to what Nelson told me to convince me to do Instagram. I had a bias against the word “influencer”, and now I'm ashamed of it. I had those biases because I thought it was just superficial, but Nelson told me something very smart. He said that social media, and influencing, are just a medium. It’s a tool. And like any tool, you do what you want with it and that’s your job; to make it you – to make it yours. It’s just a bias, and it’s up to me if I want to change that bias. It’s like any art forum, they follow a path. The first step of any new art form is to get rejected by the old academy. We see that throughout history.
The first step of any new art form is to get rejected by the old academy. We see that throughout history.
THE LOOK
Teddy Vonranson
BO: In something short, what’s your secret sauce for bringing your ideas to life?
Isabelle: Nelson. He’s like a crazy man. He’s a workaholic. He works all the time, and I’m lazy. He just pushes us all the time. Everything that’s happened to us is definitely because of his fire.
Nelson: Yeah, the pushing part, but I think more than anything you just need to try to do stuff.
Isabelle: Like Nelson always tells me, you just have to produce.
BO: How are you staying sane and inspired despite the pandemic?
Nelson: I mean it’s the same process as before the pandemic. I know it’s a bit cliche but we really do get inspired by anything. From someone, we see on the street or a bird in a window. We see something and we have an idea, from there we do something about it.
