Existentialism

A philosophic system of thought which stresses individual responsibility, freedom of choice, and the authenticity of existence. Its country of choice: France. Official color: only and strictly black. It was a movement of narrow trousers, turtleneck sweaters, and severe blouses buttoned up to the neck for those who attended the Parisian “cellars” during the 1950s, fresh from lectures by Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus. It was a dictatorship of color defied only by the use of certain typically (and thus authentically) French garments: the Brittany sailor’s white sweater with blue stripes, the beret, and the white Alsation folk blouses worn by those who favored the bars in St. Germain de Prés. In some sense a precursor of minimalism, existentialism as an aesthetic form brought not only American jazz to center stage (in those years, Miles Davis had a “scandalous” love affair in Paris with Juliette Gréco), but non-representational painting and the non-narrative cinema of Jean Luc Godard as well. It was associated with the literary début of such themes as “nausea” (the title of Sartre’s most famous novel) and “boredom” (the title of a novel by the Italian Alberto Moravia). A tedium vitae, or weariness with life, was expressed by dramatic make-up with heavy eyeshadow and a pale face for very slender young women, and by a neglected beard for men. Unique concessions to an appearance which cared little for decorum, frivolity, or a lively style. Apparently, exactly.