If What You Wear

A commission for Interior Designer, Andrew Flesher’s New York apartment, this work spans 112” wide by 18” high. Inspired by a window display at a men’s shirt shop each shirt label features a line from a poem created in collaboration with Zac Stafford. Materials include shredded paper, pattern paper and vintage textiles.

What You Wear (Detail).jpg
Oneby Zac StaffordIfWhat you wear saysWhat you can’tAndWhat you see isWhat you get,Or,A picture is worth1,000 words—ThenBy rights it standsTo reason,ThatWe should extirpate,All the brittle words;NotBy their foliage aloneBut by their dirty brittle ro…

One

by Zac Stafford

If

What you wear says

What you can’t

And

What you see is

What you get,

Or,

A picture is worth

1,000 words—

Then

By rights it stands

To reason,

That

We should extirpate,

All the brittle words;

Not

By their foliage alone

But by their dirty brittle roots

And

Why stop there?

Gather all your gabardine,

Your saddle stitched

Un-dyed wool,

Those

Teeming heaped piles

Of unwashed blues

By which

We will build a bonfire

Of vainglorious proportions

Stripped of all artifice

Painted by the blaze,

We waltz our dirty faces skyward

Ignorant of our sweet imperfections