Beauty of Youth

After nearly a fortnight of becoming disillusioned with the mainstream written word and wondering at what price has the latest SCOOP, HOT STORY, OMG GOSSIP has come to us printed in paper, I'm temporarily avoiding wanting to be in the know, all the time.  Voraciously reading my daily paper and savagely clicking on to news websites has dulled for now. 

I promise I won't be an out-of-touch dullard for too long.  For now though, Acne Paper's latest Youth issue has instead given me a slower pace of the written word to really enjoy and marvel at.  With a theme like Youth, they could so easily have used yer' standard hashed-out generation of Bright Young Things – yer' IT girls, rock sprigs, model slash actors slash bloggers slash DJs slash ingenues.  Instead though they turn to skills and sectors of the arts that are less celebrated and happen to be right up my street of interest and *shock horror* probe into People That Are Actually Talented and Skilled and Do Stuff.  Wow imagine that!

The issue is bookended by Erik Satie's score of Gymnopedie No. 3 as well as an essay on the composer at the end.  Acne Paper remembers the revolutions of the past with this piece, a definitive moment in the age of Bohemia.  In between the Satie pages, there's more gazing at the past – at the May '68 riots, at the idealistic art of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, at the fine eye of Sotheby's legend Bruce Chatwin and at the inception of Rukmini Devi's dance school Kalakshetra in India.  The idea of the preservation of youth is demonstrated in an analysis of a selection of paintings dating back to the 15th century.

In the present, Acne Paper picks out artisans and artists in areas that are becoming maligned with less of a media forum to have their talents promoted.  An organ player, a tailor on Savile Row, a craftswoman at Hermes, a horseracing jockey are profiled along with a set of "traditionalists" who are enviably skilled to do the jobs of sommelier, watchmaker, chocolatiere, perfumer, carpet weaver and more.  Conveniently, these mini-profiles fall in line with engrossing series such as Perfume on BBC4 which has had me utterly gripped and makes me yearn for informative coverage of somewhat escapist topics. 

The emphasis on the younger generation involved in arts of the 'traditional' sense is fully explored as they feature Charlie Siem, the young violinist who happens to be look great photographed with his instrument (he also performed at the recent Acne Paper launch in Paris) and a new-gen Nureyev-alike Danil Simkin as well as a beautiful photo study of the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow. 

In the few "fashion" editorials dotted about the issue, the emphasis is on pose, on persona, on the way the clothes interact with person rather than the clothes themselves.  A Bruce Weber story has actors, rappers, sports people and ballet dancers boisterously running through a palazzo in Sicily celebrating Weber's imaginary 25th birthday party and is the perfect uplifting end to an inspiring array of spotlit talent. 

This unlikely list of subjects that represent Acne Paper's version "youth" has none of the agenda that I'm getting wary of, and of course, it never fails to impress me that this is an in-house magazine of a commercially successful clothing label.  If lugging around 1.5kg of paper is a little too much or not available in your vicinity, you can actually read the whole thing online now if you zoom your browser enough.  For me, the A3 sized weight of 264 pages is preferable.