I am a multi-disciplinary fashion designer working across the fields of generative design, modular textiles, augmented reality, virtual design and upcycled materials. My practice focuses on the body within a sustainable and digital context. I explore themes of digital deterioration, glitch, file corruption and image generation. My work is centred around creating systemic change in the fashion industry to achieve a more circular model.
I graduated from from Central Saint Martins in Womenswear BA in 2020. My graduate collection has been shortlisted for the OnTimeShow award, the Mills Techstyle award and the Fashion Makes Sense award. I was a finalist on the Maison 0/green trail award and won the Runner Up MullenLowe 2020 award. I currently freelance as an AR designer. My clients have included Chalayan, Patrick McDowell and Shelter Charity.
Previous shows include Tate Exchange at Tate Modern, Transmissions at the Balenciaga Museum, #Classof2020 at the Old CSM building and Confined.work a 360° virtual exhibition by the Temporary Art Center Eindhoven. I am also a member of the Digital Maker Collec2ve, Digi.gxl, and a Fashion Revolution Student Ambassador.
My work has previously been featured by Vogue Business, 1 Granary, NOWRE, Love and Grazia.
The NOVA award provided financial support for my practice, it allowed me to counties to use maker spaces and allowed me to invest in a VR headset to develop my virtual design and world building.
Reference: ROUGIER001
Title: In Praise of Free Generators
Date: 2021
Author: Mathilde Rougier
Details: Sublimation print of the settings and results of a free online generator on garment sourced from Charity shop, Emmaus
Media: Fashion Item
Credit: Courtesy of the artist
Description: The project is an exploration of the creative potential of online generators and the possibility of developing a new kind of collaboration through open source internet resources. The project seeks to interrogate the culture of secrecy in the fashion industry vs the culture of sharing and open source in the online digital community.
Reference: ROUGIER002
Title: In Praise of Free Generators [ITEM 2]
Date: 2021
Author: Mathilde Rougier
Details: Sublimation print of the settings and results of a free online generator on garment sourced from Charity shop, Emmaus
Media: Fashion Item
Credit: Courtesy of the artist
Description: The project is an exploration of the creative potential of online generators and the possibility of developing a new kind of collaboration through open source internet resources. The project seeks to interrogate the culture of secrecy in the fashion industry vs the culture of sharing and open source in the online digital community.
Reference: ROUGIER013A
Title: Camera Roll
Date: 2020-21
Author: Mathilde Rougier
Details: screen grabs from a phone camera roll
Media: Images
Credit: Courtesy of the artist
Description: The process of the documentation is as follows, I screenshot, photograph, annotate my research and experiments in the notes app of my phone. After journaling, which is divided up into months, I screenshot the whole documentation again and print it out into physical files. These files become the crux of the work I produce. I pull from the various sources, ideas and techniques I have developed over time.
Here, I have submitted scans of the printed files, as this illustrates the digital to physical back and forth I operate in my work. The process becomes a work in and of itself.
Reference: ROUGIER014
Title: Stream of Consciousness
Date: 2020
Author: Mathilde Rougier
Details: Scans from various sources
Media: Images
Credit: Courtesy of the artist
Description: Stream of Consciousness is an excerpt of the process described for Camera Roll. The specific selection creates a work of its own, conceived as a collection.
Reference: ROUGIER005
Title: Do Androids Dream of Balenciaga SS29?
Date: 2018
Author: Robbie Barrat
Details: AI Image Generator
Media: Text and Images
Credit: ssense.com/do-androids-dream-of-balenciaga-ss29?
Description: Robbie Barrat Imagines a Future in which the Creative Director is a Computer: Using a corpus of Balenciaga runway shows, catalogues, and campaigns, a Pix2PixHD network was trained to reconstruct Balenciaga outfits from Densepose silhouettes. The results are outfits which are novel but at the same time heavily inspired by Balenciaga's past few years under Demna Gvasalia. The network lacks any contextual awareness of the non-visual functions of clothing, and in turn produces more strange outfits that completely disregard these functions.
Reference: ROUGIER015
Title: A Cyborg Manifesto
Date: 1985
Author: Donna Haraway
Details: "A Cyborg Manifesto" is an essay written by Donna Haraway and published in 1985 in the Socialist Review. In it, the concept of the cyborg is a rejection of rigid boundaries, notably those separating "human" from "animal" and "human" from "machine."
Media: Publication
Credit: wikipedia.org/A_Cyborg_Manifesto
Description: "The cyborg does not dream of community on the model of the organic family, this time without the oedipal project. The cyborg would not recognise the Garden of Eden; it is not made of mud and cannot dream of returning to dust."
Reference: ROUGIER006
Title: Spark AR
Date: 2020
Author: Mathilde Rougier
Details: Augmented reality programme
Media: Image
Credit: Courtesy of the artist
Description: A screen shot of work in progress of the Daniel Lismore AR filter collaboration.
Reference: ROUGIER007
Title: Blender
Date: 2020
Author: Mathilde Rougier
Details: 3D modelling and animation programme
Media: Image
Credit: Courtesy of the artist
Description: A screen shot of work in progress of the Daniel Lismore AR filter collaboration.
Reference: ROUGIER009
Title: VR Headset
Date: 2020
Author: Mathilde Rougier
Details: VR headset
Media: Film [0m24s]
Credit: Courtesy of the artist
Description: Video capture of MultiBrush Beta version test with the Digital Maker Collective.
Reference: ROUGIER010
Title: Personal Singer Sewing Machine
Date: 2021
Author: Mathilde Rougier
Details: Singer sewing machine
Media: Image
Credit: Courtesy of the artist
Description: Sewing machine and mannequin head.
Reference: ROUGIER003
Title: The Black Square
Date: 1915
Author: Kazimir Malevich
Details: Malevich was a Russian avant-garde artist and art theorist, whose pioneering work and writing had a profound influence on the development of non-objective, or abstract art, in the 20th century.
Media: Painting
Credit: wikipedia.org/BlackSquare(painting)
Description: Malevich painted his first Black Square in 1915 and was first shown inThe Last Futurist Exhibition 0,10. He made four variants, of which the last is thought to have been painted during the late 1920s or early 1930s.
Reference: ROUGIER011
Title: Portrait of Mr. Ivo Opstelten
Date: 2009
Author: Bert Simons
Details: Simons studied industrial design at the Design Academy Eindhoven graduating from the department 'man and living'.
Media: Sculpture
Credit: bertsimons.nl/opstelten
Description: The first step in the process of making this paper portrait was modelling Mr. Opstelten´s head in 3D. This was done in Blender, the open source CAD program.
Reference: ROUGIER004
Title: Then, the Flashes of Spirit
Date: 2011
Author: El Anatsui
Details: Aluminium, bottle tops and copper wire, 236 x 260 cm
Media: Sculpture
Credit: museivaticani.va/then--the-flashes-of-spirit
Description: Through the use of recycled materials, such as crown bottle tops, crushed, flattened and stitched together, El Anatsui creates evocative large-scale wall hangings, inspired by the richness of Kente textiles and precious Nyekor ceremonial robes.