‘Fashion Theology,’ with Dr. Robert Covolo

Dr. Robert Covolo joins Matt, Derek, and Alastair to discuss the theology of fashion — a truly unprecedented Mere Fidelity topic!

Robert Covolo

What hath Jerusalem to do with Paris, or Carthage with Milan? Dr. Robert Covolo—Director of the Center for Pastoral Residents at Christ Church Sierra Madre, former scholar at the Visual Faith Institute of Art and Architecture and faculty at the Torrey Honors Institute—joins Matt, Derek, and Alastair to discuss his latest work, Fashion Theology, where he gives an account of the dynamic relationship between theology and fashion through the rich history of Christian thought as well as recent political, social, aesthetic, literary, and performance theory.

Resources mentioned:

Quote: Slavoj Žižek, Living in the End Times

Timestamps

0:00
What hath Jerusalem to do with Paris, or Carthage with Milan?
7:32
The relationship between democracy and fashion
12:12
Have modern democratic norms allowed for real creativity, or have they stifled it?
16:15
Fashion as a realm of meaning-making
20:11
How we use fashion to individuate ourselves within our preferred subcultures
27:40
The way in which clothing gives us insight into what the human person is
32:07
Theological aesthetics and fashion
35:43
How do we relate the political reality of how clothes are made with the surface reality of how they appear?
41:34
How should Christians dress?

Follow Derek, Andrew, and Alastair for more tweet-sized brilliance. Thanks to Caleb Wait for keeping us organized. Special thanks to Tim Motte for sound editing. And thanks to The Joy Eternal for lending us their music, which everybody should download out of gratitude for their kindness.

Modernity Aesthetics
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