Aldo Gigli · Cofondatore del Mirano Continental · scenografo e grafico
L'Importanza della Moda al Mirano
Il Mirano Continental non era solo una discoteca. Negli anni '80 il club ospitava regolarmente sfilate, concorsi e serate dedicate al mondo dei modelli, portando moda e spettacolo dal vivo nella vita notturna bruxellese.
Tra questi appuntamenti, il concorso « Devenir Mannequin » è rimasto nella memoria del locale: un palco abituato a dj e riflettori diventava, per una sera, una passerella dove il pubblico incontrava il mondo della moda.
La stampa belga ha seguito questo concorso per anni, dal « colpo di spinta » descritto da Le Soir nel 1992 fino all'apertura ai giovani dai 15 ai 30 anni nel 1999: un trampolino per chi sognava la professione, in Belgio e a livello internazionale.
Nel 1983 la RTBF dedicò un reportage al concorso « Devenir Mannequin 83 » al Mirano, con il giornalista Joseph Lewkowicz. Il 12 dicembre 1989 la rivista Marie Claire organizzò una sfilata al Mirano intorno alla modella Dominique Goossens, sotto gli occhi di Carl De Moncharline, che avrebbe gradualmente assunto la direzione artistica del locale a partire dal 1991.
Un'altra sfilata di Marie Claire si tenne al Mirano nel 1986 o nel 1987, immortalata da Michel Godfroid Meding, allora fotografo esordiente. Lui racconta: « Il mio amico Renaud, modello da New e barman lì, mi aveva procurato un invito. Ero sistemato in balconata accanto ai tecnici delle luci con il mio monopiede, la Contax RTS 2 e il 300 mm Carl Zeiss (senza autofocus), pellicola 160 T forzata a 640 ISO. » Le sue immagini, scattate dalla balconata con pochissima luce, restituiscono l'atmosfera esatta di quelle serate: colore saturo, grana, movimento.
L'album qui sotto raccoglie le foto di sfilata conservate negli archivi: le sfilate di Marie Claire del 1986-87 e del 1989, la presentazione autunno-inverno di Charles Dorfeuil del 1983 e passerelle degli anni '80, dalla scenografia fantascientifica ai lamé dorati.
Album fotografico: sfilate al Mirano Continental, anni '80. Foto © Olivier Hennebert, © Mark Stevens e © Michel Godfroid Meding, alcuni crediti: DR. Cliccate sulla foto per sfogliare l'album.
Segnala trascrizione
RTBF news presenter: Another segment offered by our colleagues at RTBF Brussels. A contest whose theme is “Becoming a model”. You be the judge.
Joseph Lewkowicz: The other evening, at the Mirano in Brussels, the suspense could be read on the faces. Twelve boys and twelve girls were taking part in the “Devenir Mannequin” contest.
Make-up artist: Everyone is here. Everyone is here.
Show manager: At the end of the show, Robert Malengreau, the presenter, will call you one by one by your names and you will go and introduce yourselves.
Robert Malengreau: “Devenir Mannequin”? It means wanting to play the game. Wanting to do something that sometimes seems impossible, that often seems impossible in Belgium.
Joseph Lewkowicz: Why does that seem impossible in Belgium?
Robert Malengreau: No, back in 69, when we created this, when I talked about it to the agencies (at the time there was one modelling agency) and when they talked to me about it, they talked about it as a dream. I mean: going to New York, Paris… Models in Belgium simply did not exist. And I was convinced that in Belgium there were absolutely very pretty girls, very handsome guys who wanted to do this job.
Joseph Lewkowicz: Dominique Fache, what is at stake in this “Devenir Mannequin 83” contest?
Dominique Fache: It is a challenge we are throwing at public opinion, because in Belgium this profession is absolutely not recognised as a valuable one at the moment.
Joseph Lewkowicz: You run a modelling agency. Do houses like yours hire these young people afterwards, when they win contests like this?
Dominique Fache: Absolutely. The people we are going to try to make win tonight are guaranteed a career. It will also depend on them. A theoretically international career.
Joseph Lewkowicz: So, what is a model to you?
Dominique Fache: A model is not only 50% looks, it is also 50% mindset.
Joseph Lewkowicz: Do you believe it is a profession with a future in Belgium or even elsewhere?
Robert Malengreau: There is more and more future everywhere. Because in this profession, new faces are needed all the time. People need to be renewed all the time. It is terrible too. It is quite a terrifying law, the law of this profession. But it is there, there is nothing to be done about it.
Segnala trascrizione
Dominique Goossens: Frank, could you bring me a chocolate, anything, something to eat when I'm starving? Yes, I know. If the make-up is beautiful, and he does it as usual, that's already very good; I'll already feel in great shape to begin. It's very important. Today is really the summit in Brussels. It's the event to see. It's the event to live.
Dominique Goossens: It's also the event to do for a model tonight.
Dominique Goossens: Do I like all the clothes I wear? In general, yes, but it's not always the truth, but that's not our problem. That's not what we should think about. You have to know, even if we don't like them, the sine qua non is to wear it well and above all to sell it. That's why we're here.
Dominique Goossens: The accessory is what makes the outfit. It's essential. The accessory, I mean a simple black dress. It can be very beautiful, but it will be much more beautiful if the hat you wear it with is adequate.
Etienne Russo, from the Mirano to Villa Eugénie
One name cannot be left unspoken at the end of this chapter: Etienne Russo. Artistic director of the Mirano before Carl De Moncharline, who would gradually succeed him from 1991, he directed the fashion shows and ran the Smirnoff Fashion Award, whose finals were held in the former cinema on the chaussée de Louvain. For him, fashion was never one activity among many: it was his natural ground, and the club offered it to him as a laboratory.
Accanto ad Aldo Gigli, Etienne Russo vide prendere vita i suoi primi allestimenti grandiosi. Una serata è rimasta emblematica: « Gli Abissi », il 25 giugno 1992, con una scenografia sottomarina ideata da Aldo che invadeva il club e trasformava la Grande Balena in un bar. La locandina ritrovata, firmata da Patrick Gennaro Avella e non da Aldo Gigli, è oggi la preziosa testimonianza visiva di quell'universo, di cui non sembra essersi conservata alcuna fotografia dell'allestimento. Anni dopo, osservando il fondale marino della scenografia di una grande sfilata firmata Villa Eugénie, viene da sorridere: quel sogno era già accaduto, una notte, al Mirano.
When Etienne Russo left the Mirano to fly on his own, the career that followed became unique in the world: Villa Eugénie, the first Dries Van Noten show in Paris in 1991, then hundreds of productions for Chanel, Hermès, Louis Vuitton, Dior Homme, Moncler and so many others. But something was born here, in this place where Aldo Gigli knew how to turn a drawing sheet into party architecture: it is no exaggeration to say that the Mirano allowed his first dreams to hatch.
Carl De Moncharline also inherited from Etienne Russo a standard that never left him: a perfectionism pushed beyond perfection, a care for detail down to the invisible. It is a line Carl tried to hold throughout his career, in another register, large-scale public events, but with the same conviction: the care given to what the audience will never notice is precisely what gives an evening its greatness.