📢 Very excited that our new article, “The Glam Clown: Couture, Clowning and Speculative/Spectacular Imaginaries of Fashion”, has just been published in “Fashion, Style & Popular Culture”.
In the article, the fabulous Dita Svelte and I explore the strange and fascinating overlap between haute couture, avant-garde performance and clown aesthetics – from Joseph Grimaldi and Jean-Gaspard Deburau to David Bowie, Leigh Bowery, Lady Gaga, Harley Quinn and Joker.
The piece also connects to a broader question that shapes much of our work at Popsicule / in science communication and popular culture research: how do spectacle, performance and visual excess shape public meaning-making?
Whether we are talking about fashion, celebrity culture or science, contemporary culture increasingly operates through attention economies. Visibility and performance matters. Exaggeration circulates. Spectacle travels.
Somewhere between fashion theory, circus history media studies and pop culture, we argue for the emergence of a new cultural figure: the “glam clown”.

Find out more:
https://intellectdiscover.com/content/journals/10.1386/fspc_00388_1?originator=authorOffprint&identity=33334184&ts=20270506050511&signature=1cefcf3b685de7066211c7f0e9efa728

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