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Updated 09 May, 2019 06:46am

The Met Gala Floors All With The Theme, Camp: Notes on Fashion

Farah Vayani

Every year, we wait to see what theme will be set for the Met Gala. This year, the theme was Camp. What is Camp, you ask?

Let’s start with how it began. The word ‘Camp’ was derived from French: se camper which means ‘to flaunt’ or ‘to posture’ first appeared in a play by Molière in 1671. It then appeared in the hallowed pages of a dictionary in 1909 with an entry that read: actions and gestures of exaggerated emphasis. Used chiefly by persons of exceptional want of character.

Susan Sontag published “Notes on Camp” in 1964 in the Fall issue of Partisan Review around the time the word ‘camp’ had begun to appear in literary and popular magazines. Sontag however, explored the subject seriously and catalogued a form of 58 notes on it! The Origins of camp were located as far back as the 17th and 18th century because of that period’s extraordinary feeling for artifice, for surface, for symmetry & Sontag framed it as ‘unmistakably modern’ where she captured the sensibility of the era and promoted ‘the equivalence of all objects.’

In the 19th century, the word ‘Camp’ acquired homosexual connotations as part of a coded language among gay men where the language was topsy turvy – men were known as women, friends as sisters and lovers as wives and husbands.

To break it down as much as possible, according to Thomas Meehan (American playwright who wrote, Hairspray, The Producers & Annie), “Camp is a ‘third stream of taste, that encompasses the curious attraction that everyone – to some degree at least – has for the bizarre and the blatantly outrageous.”

 

Co Chairs, Alessandro Michele & Harry Styles

How to be comfortable with your masculinity

 

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Yesterday it was the first Monday of May. While this date may seems normal for many people, some you may know that it is the date for the annual Met Gala also known as the Met Ball. It is a fundraising gala for the benefit of the Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute in New York City. the Gala is famously known, because the guest have to dress according to a theme. This year the theme was Camp. Camp was describe by Susan Sontag that wrote an essay about it as « is not a natural mode of sensibility, if there be any such. Indeed the essence of Camp is its love of the unnatural: of artifice and exaggeration ». Needless to say that this year, the guest could be as extra as possible. I am a big fan of this event, because for me fashion is at is best and I am always so thrilled to see what people are going to be wearing. Here a few pictures, of my favorite outfit from yesterday. xxZ #metgala #metball #metgala2019 #camp #campnotesonfashion #harrystyles #alessandromichele #lizzo #ryanmurphy #dualipa #ezramiller #saoirseronan #hamishbowles #florencewelch #billyporter #michaelurie

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ZENDAYA

How to be a real life Cinderella… & leave your glass slipper at the ball.

 

 

 

 

LADY GAGA

How to out do the others with not one, not two but FOUR costume changes!

 

KATY PERRY

How to light up the pink carpet with outrageous costumes, TWICE.

 

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・ @katyperry #MetGala ?❤

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EZRA MILLER

How to nail The Met Gala theme down to a tee!

 

 

RIHANNA

How to play it safe and ghost the biggest fashion event of the year!

 

GIGI HADID 

How to make a McQueen reminiscent look work in Michael Kors

 

 

JARED LETO

How to make 2 faced high fashion

 

 

MICHAEL URIE

How to bring the death of toxic masculinity, a coin termed for the boys that nailed the theme!

 

 

Diane Von Furstenberg

How to honour Lady Liberty at a prestigious event

 

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BIG, BOLD, and CAMP #metgala2019 #camp

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JANELLE MONAE

How to make Picasso proud in what you wear!

 

 

 

CELINE DION

Grace is, dripping in glittering tassels but looking ON POINT.

 

 

BILLY PORTER

How to WIN at the Met Gala. Cleopatra would be proud of the look, that fashionable entrance and sass! 3 for 3, BP!

 

 

 

And last but not the least of our favourites,

MARY KATE & ASHLEY OLSEN

Not on theme, but SO chic, we can’t not post them!

 

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