DALLAS, Mar 12, 2011/ FW/ — Yohji Yamamoto does not need an introduction. His legacy in fashion goes all the way back to the 1980s when he led the Japanese fashion wave all the way to the 1990s and the new millennium.

In October 2009, after a series of bad investments, Yamamoto Inc. went bankrupt; by the end of that year the designer had inaugurated a new business and a complete reevaluation of his direction.

My Dear Bombis an outcome of this transition moment. Coauthored with Ai Mitsuda, this carefully and beautifully written autobiography (with biographical interpolations by friends and collaborators) seamlessly combines extended meditations on clothing and life with Yamamoto’s memories and anecdotes, in short, concise paragraphs.

Throughout its pages, we encounter Yamamoto as a tough realist unburdened by disingenuousness (“I am, in fact, a man who may turn heartless in an instant; I desire only to settle each and every score immediately”); and, of course, as a great designer blessed with unerring instinct for his materials (“How does the cloth want to drape, to sway, to fall?

If one keeps these things in mind and looks very carefully, the fabric itself begins to speak”). Illustrated with drawings by Yamamoto, this open-hearted meditation offers a take on the autobiography form as imaginative as the designer’s fashion ware.

A retrospective show of Yamamoto’s work is on view at London’s Victoria and Albert Museum from March 12 – July 10, 2011.

YOHJI YAMAMOTO: MY DEAR BOMB
ISBN 978-90-5544-979-8
Paperback, 6 x 8.75 inches, 192 pages, 25 b&w
U.S. $39.95 CDN $44.00
Published by Ludion
Distributed by D.A.P. | www.artbook.com

Publication Date: June 2011