The term “separate the art from the artist” has never been truer than at the 2023 Met Gala, which sought to pay tribute to fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld through its theme: “Karl Lagerfeld: A Line of Beauty”. Most known for his contribution to Chanel, Lagerfeld became an international success from the 1980s to the early 2000s. To say his work changed the industry would be an understatement to many. However, along with his growing fame came his ever-insistent need to voice every opinion that came to mind. From fatphobia to racism, Lagerfeld did not miss a single beat in managing to offend almost every minority group.
If I wanted to, I could very well spend paragraphs on pages about Lagerfeld’s controversies. But, unlike the Met, I do not wish to spend my time honoring a man who does not deserve it. His most notable controversies, however, are relevant to his work in the fashion industry and only further its hateful notions.
Lagerfeld hated fat people. He was almost always criticizing women’s weights, often through passive-aggressive remarks. On Adele, he said: “She is a little too fat, but she has a beautiful face and divine voice.”; on Heidi Klum: “Heidi Klum is no runway model. She is simply too heavy and has too big a bust.” He could not let women exist in their bodies without making passing comments. Lagerfeld also expressed disdain for the #MeToo movement, particularly when it came to models sharing their experiences in the industry. After regulations were put on the modeling industry, Lagerfeld complained to incredible lengths about how they were “too much” and how models should “join a nunnery” if they “didn’t want their pants pulled down”.
And though he was a hateful man, the Met still decided to honor him as its theme for 2023. What’s so incredulous about this is not the fact that he was being honored, but the radio silence when his actions were called into question. The industry, particularly the Met Gala’s guests, is filled with people he would have hated: LGBTQ+ people, plus-size women, BIPOC, and anybody who did not fit into his ‘size 00, perfect white person’ expectation. But of course, they could not have excluded them all from the Gala, so why did they exclude all of Lagerfeld’s hate instead?
Ultimately, the Met serves as a representation of the elitist and hateful fashion industry that so many choose to buy into daily. Built on exclusivity – the very exclusivity that fuels the West – it is one of the most rigid industries. From pushing the standard of a size 00 model to only representing white beauty standards, its roots are found in a similar hate as Lagerfeld’s. The ignorance of Lagerfeld’s history represents the notion of ‘separating the art from the artist’, where privileged people would rather celebrate a horrible person’s work rather than acknowledge their flaws. They don’t value art, of course, rather they value the hypocrisy that comes from honoring someone whose actions have never affected them, and never will. It comes from a place of arrogance and selfishness, the idea that if they are not the victim, nobody is.
The industry is not interested in the average consumer. Instead, they prioritize glamorizing a racist, homophobic, sexist – really, the list is never ending – designer who expressed more hate than he did love.