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Michael Angel

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NEW YORK, September 10, 2010
By Alison Baenen
"How can I do what I do with prints and be a minimalist?" So pondered Michael Angel, the Australian with a gift for graphics who wants a piece of the big-time nineties revival now in full effect. His answer? Make the prints fantastic, and simplify the rest.

Prints, of course, are Angel's bright, sexy calling card, and as usual, they were a success. The same was true of the simplification—up to a point. The predominant silhouette (a double-layer trompe l'oeil wrap skirt with a revealing front thigh slit) looked fresh, but Angel showed too many subtle variations of it, and not much else. Minimalism shouldn't mean minimal options.

Angel did use the skirt layers effectively to experiment with texture. Leather paired with silk twill had depth, and a bottom layer encrusted with a frosting of heavy sequins emerged and disappeared as its wearer moved. Up above, he cut a men's dress shirt off at the breastbone, creating a midriff-exposing collar top that appeared, in one form or another, in almost every look.

Intrigued by the pious modesty he had observed on a recent holiday in Rome, Angel played with the idea of hiding and revealing. He used latex (a naughty rejoinder to the ecclesiastical inspiration) to obscure the salient parts of the female form. Layered over the prints, the opaque latex made for an interesting color play. It was smart to pair the showstopping prints with cleanly tailored separates with an edge. Next time, it would be nice to see a few more choices.

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