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New exhibition: Shoes: Pleasure and Pain

Monday, 15. June 2015 - 12:18

WHAT do “Man and Boy” by Tony Parsons, “The Devil Wears Prada” by Lauren Weisberger and Audrey Niffenegger’s “The Time Traveller’s Wife” have in common? Like many books, they have shoes on the cover. Such images are a subtle way of getting readers to imagine the life of the character concerned, to put themselves in their shoes, as the saying goes. And since shoes tend to date less quickly than clothes they can be curiously revealing. Show someone a stranger’s footwear and they will immediately know just enough about the owner to pique their interest. A new exhibition at the Victoria & Albert Museum (V&A) in London plays with humanity’s longstanding love affair with shoes, and reveals a surprisingly universal fascination with what they conceal.

The exhibition opens with a series of interwoven fables that hinge on shoes. One will be immediately obvious to anyone raised on a diet of Disney: a young woman is first identified and then socially elevated by her slipper. “Cinderella” is not just a Western fairy-tale, though. It dates back to fourth-century Egypt. A crueller variant comes in the tale (and later film) of “The Red Shoes”, in which pride and vanity—symbolised by the show-stopping footwear—are pitilessly punished. But men are just as susceptible to the power of what they wear on their feet: the cunning hero of a 17th-century tale, Hop-o’-my-Thumb, saves his brothers from starvation by stealing a pair of magic “seven-league boots”. The idea of shoes that lend their owners particular beauty or speed continues to be used in fashion and sportswear advertising.

Shoes have often aimed more directly at seduction. No one knows the precise origins of the Chinese tradition for breaking the toe bones of young girls, bending them underneath the soles, and then binding the feet into the desired “three-inch-golden-lotus” shape. It was relatively common by the 11th century in all but the poorest women and the practice only died out in the 20th century. Bound feet restricted movement—they signalled that the woman had servants to do her walking for her—and were also considered highly erotic, both in themselves and because of the shuffling gait that women had to adopt. Oiran, high-class prostitutes in Japan, meanwhile, had to contend with heavy wooden clogs that could have platforms well over 20cm tall. Again this forced them to adopt a very slow, ritualised walk that showed off their clothes and, presumably, stamina. Fetishised footwear in the West include a pair of beautiful scarlet boots from Sweden, made at the beginning of the 20th century, and numerous pairs of mule heels. Their allure is neatly illustrated by a small reproduction of Fragonard’s “The Swing” (c. 1767)—this was a shoe only too ready to slip off its owner's feet, its looseness presumably echoing that of its owner’s morals.

Because shoes come into contact with the ground, they are a brilliant way of showing off wealth. Who but someone with money to spare and no need to do anything for themselves would wear highly decorative, uncomfortable, laughably impractical footwear? There is plenty of that here, and you can but wonder at humanity's ingenuity when it comes to dressing from the knee down. Men, it seems, are just inventive as women. One cabinet holds a pair of early-modern European gentleman’s boots with fold-overs so large they force the wearer to walk bow-legged. Poulaines, long narrow shoes with toes curled up like the tips of Salvador Dali’s moustache, were popular in the 14th century. More wonderful still are the intricately embroidered interiors of a pair of otherwise very plain pair of leather slippers from 19th-century Turkey: the decoration would only have been revealed as the owner walked away. “Shoes: Pleasure and Pain” is a quirky little gem of an exhibition: who knew our soles had so much to say?

Shoes: Pleasure and Pain is at the V&A in London until January 16th 2016.

Source: 
www.economist.com
Tags: 
New exhibition
Shoes