Coco Chanel. Pioneer of a modern image of women? (PDF)

Pre-University Paper from the year 2014 in the subject Art - History of Art, grade: 15 points, , language: English, abstract: The question of this subject paper in the seminar subject "Art and Culture in Germany in the Twenties and Thirties" is "Coco Chanel - Pioneer of a Modern Image of Women?". During the research for my previous paper with the topic "The change of the image of women from the Weimar Republic to National Socialism" [I] developed an interest in the question to what extent Chanel has influenced our fashion today and consequently also the current image of women. (...)

Basically, my research will aim at discussing the question to what extent and by what means Chanel has contributed to the development of the modern image of women. Since Coco Chanel was first and foremost a fashion designer, her influence will presumably also be seen on the fashion level in particular, so that I will try to set the focus of the work there. I will probably build up my elaboration roughly as follows: First, I will explain the image of women at the time before Chanel's influence, whereby I will present the social role of women at that time as well as women's fashion, in order to enable a comparison and to make clear Chanel's presumably divergent view. This is followed by a brief overview of Chanel's life and her particular lifestyle, which is followed by a presentation of her fashion creations.

Finally, in order to answer the question of Chanel's influence on a modern image of women, I will examine what in today's (fashion) everyday life is still reminiscent of her work at that time. Finally, I will draw a conclusion and thus answer the previous problem.