Breathe
By Sac-Nicté Guevara Calderon
During the inaugural ball of Donald Trump's second term, it was his daughter -and former presidential advisor- who grabbed the attention of fashion lovers. Ivanka appeared on stage in a replica of the dress that Hubert de Givenchycreated for Audrey Hepburn and that the actress wore in the movie Sabrinaalso starring Humphrey Bogart and William Holden. The couture atelier of the same fashion house was in charge of the recreation. A statement shared with Vogue by a White House spokesperson mentioned, "Audrey Hepburn has long been a personal inspiration to Ivanka, who considers it a great privilege to honor her legacy in this way, and is incredibly grateful to the Givenchy team for making this moment a reality." In the notes published by different media, they describe Ivanka as "radiant", "splendid", "dazzling", and although a Vogue text promises, in the title, to explain "the deep meaning of the dress", it remains only in a "why" that the author never resolves. Superficial recounting, criticism that remains what Ivanka undoubtedly intended: the astonishment of the first glance.
On social media, however, the irony of Ivanka's choice did not go unnoticed. Diet Prada asked in a publication on instagram: "what would humanitarian Audrey Hepburn, who was part of the Dutch resistance against the Nazis, think of this 'tribute'?", and several users of different networks replied similar questions and recalled, in limited characters, the work as an activist of the actress.
Sabrina follows the story of the daughter of Thomas Fairchild, the Larrabee family chauffeur, from her first crush on one of the Larrabee brothers, her trip to Paris and her return to the United States, completely transformed.
Even more than Breakfast at Tiffany's (my personal favorite), Sabrina built the image of Audrey Hepburn that became timeless, with the most perfect pixie cut in history, sheathed for the very first time in Givenchy, a collaboration that was repeated in Hepburn's subsequent films - the actress demanded it in her contracts - and that would become an entrenched friendship.
For Vanessa Friedman, the inaugural ball's display was a recreation of an America that wants to pretend it is identical to Hollywood, one in which it doesn't mind awarding a film like Emilia Perez or denying anything beyond the binary. The choice of Ivanka fits that vision Friedman describes: it is the taking of a film, a character, an actress and a dress from the most superficial side possible.
But Audrey was so much more. And so is fashion.
During World War II, in occupied Holland, Audrey was part of the resistance: she was a courier, delivering medicine, food and errands; she was an interpreter and raised funds as a dancer in secret recitals called "black evenings" or "dark nights". In addition, her family hid a British paratrooper in their home after the Battle of Arnhem. Her activism did not end when she became one of Hollywood's most iconic stars, as she was a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador from 1988 to 1993, the year of her death.
In the essay "An Audrey girl" Carrie Courogen writes: "I can't help but wonder: how is it possible that, in a culture increasingly bent on re-examining women of the past, Hepburn has done nothing but continue to shrink into oversimplification? When do we begin to see her films as mere aspiration, comfort food, rather than the complicated tombstones they are?"
"Fashion functions as a mirror of our times, so it is inherently political," notes Andrew Bolton in Power Dressing: Charting the Influence of Politics on Fashion, an article by Maya Singer for Vogue. "It has been used to express patriotic, nationalistic and propagandistic tendencies, as well as complex issues related to class, race, ethnicity, gender and sexuality." A reel by Vanessa Rosales for The Gazing also talks about how when thinking about the relationship between fashion and politics, style is often associated with rebellions. As an example, there is the green scarf that spread from Argentina to the rest of Latin America. It is less common for us to think of fashion as a nod to dangerous, conservative, fascist stances, because therein lies the trap of its supposed superficiality, of thinking of Ivanka's choice as a reflection of "old money" style or "silent luxury" or any other trend that, in reality, is not as fleeting or as innocent as it seems. "Fashion has historically served, in many cases, to be an element of nationalist identity, and that's exactly what Donald Trump embodies, and exactly what whiteness in power embodies many times, this idea that a certain aesthetic is the right one because it's white, because it's appropriate, because it's elegant," Vanessa Rosales also says.
This choice of Ivanka is part of the performance of the extreme right, of white supremacy, of anti-immigrant policies, in short, of the newly elected political power in the United States.
Ivanka did not understand (and probably will never understand) that Billy Wilder's Sabrina is not just another adaptation of Cinderella in couture dresses, it is a critique of the class system, which is dedicated to showing the so-called "American dream" as a lie. Courogen also writes in this regard, "The more I watch Sabrina, and the older I get, the clearer I see Billy Wilder's contempt for American class politics. The rich are blithely cruel; they worship workaholism and stoicism; they distrust outsiders. People, in the Larrabees' world, are expendable. Money is not."
Emma Kathleen Hepburn Ferrer, granddaughter of the actress, weighed in on Ivanka's choice on Instagram, "Let me explain. More than just being a fashion icon, Audrey Hepburn was elegance personified. This started early: it's documented that as a teenager, she secretly danced to raise money for the Dutch resistance. Then, at the height of her fame, she shunned the Hollywood spotlight to raise her children in Europe, and spent her later years gardening in Lake Geneva and championing UNICEF's efforts to help children facing war and famine. His legacy consists of style, yes, but also substance, something that calls for a measured and thoughtful tribute, not an imitation."
I have no doubt that the motive behind the choice of that dress was to convey the memory of the conversation between Sabrina and her father in which the young woman, in a moment of reverie, declares, "The moon is looking for me!", but in reality, to the surprise of not a few, it ended up being like a dialogue between Thomas Fairchild and Linus Larrabee:
-May I ask, sir, what exactly are your intentions?
-My intentions? Unethical, reprehensible, but very practical.
*Sac-Nicté Guevara Calderón holds a Master's degree in Hispanic American Literature from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid and a Master's degree in Communication from the Universidad Iberoamericana. Founder and director of the magazine La Desvelada. She is currently studying for a PhD in Modern Literature at the Universidad Iberoamericana.
The opinions expressed are the responsibility of the authors and are absolutely independent of the position and editorial line of the company. Opinion 51.
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