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Wednesday, May 22, 1963 New York Herald Tribune Fash ..Americans 1963 [[3 images]] Top: Marisol, one of the artists represented, has several painted and wood plaster pieces in the show. Above left: This group was among those more formally attired. Above right: At his party after the opening John Kloss chats with painter Jane Wilson. Inside Fashion Dress Optional By Eugenia Sheppard Women's Feature Editor Hundreds of women must have been thrown into a tizzy recently when invitations to the Museum of Modern Art's preview of its new show, "Americans 1963," arrived in the mail. Printed in the right hand corner of each invitation were the words "Dress Optional." Dress Optional, unleashed one of the wildest fashion hodge-podges in the Museum's history, and it has seen some fairly weird fashion events in its time. This get-ups were so unique that you felt as if some casting director genius behind the scenes was sending out each character one at a time. The scene would have been sheer heaven as part of a film like Fellini's "Dolce Vita." I've often wondered what happens to those hand-knit, hand-loomed, hand-woven, hand-painted stoles that tourists are always bringing back from Mexico, South America, Italy or Helsinki. Well, they were out in full force at the Museum opening Monday night. Most women obviously felt that fur was too square for the occasion. Mink was completely missing and only one stalwart was wrapped defiantly in chinchilla. The majority of female guests-even those few who wore little black dresses-were dressing optional with hand-made fabric stoles slung over one shoulder or folded and carried over one arm. On the whole, it was a young crowd, and the big fashion for girls was the high waisted dress. A simple, shift type dress was made of rough silks in all the pastel colors, and the waistline happened anywhere from just below the neck on down. You might have thought lots of Chanel evening suits would make the opening partly, but only one turned up, looking as if it had strayed away from some other performance. Chanel suits are too studied for Dress Optional, and they look best, anyway, when they are seen in coveys, like quail. Hair-do's were straight and fairly complicated, mostly with topknots, but the most fascinating fashion was the evening hat. Not the kind of evening hat that the uptown milliners are always dreaming about--some kind of romantic nonsense with tulle, ostrich and flowers--but a hard crowned white derby with a ribbon band. Even girls in little black dresses cut down to the waist in back kept derbies on their heads all evening. Almost every woman in the place was wearing earrings. The one piece of jewelry that was strictly taboo was that conventional string of cultured pearls. Big fashions for men were beards and dark plaid or pin striped sports jackets, blue chambray shirts. Questioned on the popularity of the blue chambray shirt, several men admitted that they find the shade flattering. It makes them look healthy and outdoorsy. After the opening, I got a close-up of some of the Americans 1963 inner circle at a party given by designer John Kloss, who has been making clothes for artists and wives of artists in return for works of art. The Kloss apartment is in one of the new, not quite finished Kips Bay apartment buildings that, outside, looks like a giant honey comb, with its walks that are all windows and, inside, gives you such a look at the city as you never had before. The inner circle is long on ladies not only with talent but good looks. A couple of real beauties against Kloss' background of Indiana and Rosenquist paintings and Odenbrug's plaster bathing suit attached to one wall, were Marisol and Jane Wilson, formerly a successful fashion model. Both of them were wearing conventional short, sheer evening dresses, designed by the host. When it said Dress Optional, the Museum of Modern Art doubtless felt it was being kind to its guests. Actually, though, it's that magic phrase "Black Tie" that makes like fairly easy for everybody. A man has only to drag out his dinner jacket or say he's too tired and settle for darkest blue. A woman slips into a little black dress, winds a piece of pet fur around her shoulders and away they go. The boys and girls worked a lot harder than that over dressing optional the other night. Red-haired Mrs. Ray (Laura) Johnson wore a gray and white python dress to tee off the new Samuel Robert leather collection, in which she's involved. "Today I put on a snake dress, hoping some of its coolness will rub off on me," she said at Robert's opening luncheon at the Americana, but she wasn't kidding anybody into thinking she was a shy amateur. She has all the poise in the world and is a born fashion show commentator. The Samuel Robert collection has some cute numbers, including a smock, a turtleneck pullover top and a belted storm coat/ London's Freddie Starke had such good luck in Paris recently with his ready-to-wear collection that he plans to show it in New York for a week, starting June 3. He'll be at the Hotel Pierre. A switch from her usual French wardrobe, Mrs. Norman (Rosita) Winston is off for a summer in Paris and on the Riviera with a trunkful of made-in-America clothes. In the collection are a pink tweed suit with flowered blouse from Jean Louis, Gus Tassell's pale green silk with high waist and long sleeves, and a couple of at home muu-muus of flowered silk, designed by Jacques Tiffeau. She also tucked in a couple of Adolfo's veiling turbans. At the Gilded Cage Ball Monday night, out came birds in black leotards, white wigs by Kenneth and dark glasses. Susan Stein, Betsy Theodoracopolus, Jane Holzer, Caroline Windisch-Graetz, Marina Chickering, Nan Kempner and Canessa McConnell danced Killer Joe's latest "The Bird Dance." Chairman Sally Scheftel wore St. Laurent's pale blue satin, Mrs. Joseph Tankoos was also in pale blue, Baroness Hubert von Pantz in turquoise, Susan Stein in Bob Bugnand's fabulous empire line black and white spotted skirt. The Trend of the Times in Modern Art By John Gruen Of The Herald Tribune Staff "Americans 1963" has just opened at New York's Museum of Modern Art, and that all encompassing stamp of approval--that much sought after bear hug--has this year been granted to 15 American painters and sculptors who, as curator Dorothy C. Miller (who selected them) put it, "should be more fully known to the museum's public." "The show," she said, "is not designed to illustrate a trend, make classifications or favor any age group. The artists have been selected simply as individuals. The emphasis is on variety rather than on a single style or movement." In thus defining the aim of this scrupulously selected group, Mrs. Miller avoided mention of the preponderance of neo-realist art as represented by such artists as Chryssa, Robert Indiana, Class Oldenburg and James Rosenquist, allowing the public, the artists, the critics to come upon it and draw their own conclusions. The conclusions are vey simple. The Museum of Modern Art must follow the trend of the times have made it increasingly clear that "Pop" art is here! If it is here to stay, the museum will not say. But do what you will, Oldenburg's catalogue statement: "I am for the art of underwear and the art of taxicabs. I am for the art of ice cream cones dropped on concrete," has, at least for the present, the museum's full indorsement. If the museum has stressed the neo-realists, or "Pop" artists, it has also judiciously surrounded them with the work of artists some of whose interest are perhaps a bit more far - reaching. These include Bontecou, Higgins, Kohn, Lindner, Marisol and Drummond. But the all-out neo realists are Indiana, whose stenciled adages on crisp circular shapes command one to "Take All," "Tilt" and "Eat"; Chryssa, who makes neon lights blink on and off (commanding you to do nothing at all); Oldenburg, who makes plaster pastries, sundaes and hamburgers, and paints them in garishly vulgar colors; and Rosenquist, whose entertaining juxtapositions of huge billboard subjects creates a movie screen image gone haywire. If anything, the show impresses with its vitality. One senses a "newness" in the air, a feeling of activity, a decided restlessness and discovery on the part of younger artists. On these terms, "Americans 1963" must be called a success. [[image]] Hmmmmm- that's a Blue Grass fragrance Thumb-size push button
