Fashion Killed The Radio Star- Mash Up

It wasn't a pretty picture: ill-fitting jeans, a tucked-in golf shirt, black-and-white socks and a helmet that could make Michael Dukakis blush. People were gasping in the audience," says her longtime publicist, Liz Rosenberg, of the star's had said; "An ex-boyfriend of mine leaned over and said, 'Her career is over before it even started.' Of course, I was petrified." A mercurial, contradictory and shrewd woman in her early 50's, an informed art patron, a doting mother, a tempestuous employer, she is also a typical baby boomer whose early training as a political scientist may, as it turns out, be the most revealing element of her design résumé. she wore a lascivious reinterpretation of a wedding gown -- a white bustier and a shredded white tutu -- accessorized with lace gloves, dangerously high heels, clunky necklaces and a tulle veil that didn't stay on her head very long. "At the moment she is totally monumental," Kal Ruttenstein, said after her show. "She leads everyone." Mr. Ruttenstein's is anything but a minority view. "Everyone else is doing Prada and everything else looks old next to her." Although Some people thought she was the greatest thing ever, and other people thought she was disgusting. But the professional fashion police were much more forgiving. She started her performance dancing on top of a giant wedding cake and ended it by rolling around the stage humping her veil and revealing her panties to a live TV audience. "she took it so much further than anyone knew she was capable of," most replied. "New York belonged to her," said Robert Burke, the fashion director of Bergdorf Goodman, referring to a season in which the runway shows of one designer after another paid her what could politely be termed homage. The presidential campaign trail is, of course, littered with near-fatal fashion statements. Dukakis' decision to don a helmet while riding a tank in a military photo op in 1988 all but cost him the election. Huey Lewis, who also performed that night, says he admired Madonna's nerve. "She didn't just have the idea on the spur of the moment," he says. "She had practiced it at rehearsal. It was thought-out, and it turned out to be a history-making performance. She knew what was going on with the medium of television, and we clearly didn't." Tim Gunn, the stylish host of Bravo's "Project Runway," was equally forgiving, arguing that compared with the baggy getups that most women call clothes on the weekend, she was a picture of casual refinement.
"This is clearly an everywoman's style," said White, " this is fashion."
Did fashion kill her career? You decide.



Madonna Article Ref: http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/madonna/articles/story/6085507/50_moments_that_changed_the_history_of_rock__roll_madonna_at_the_vmas_in_1984
Prada Article Ref:
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/03/fashion/shows/03DIAR.html

Obama Article Ref:
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2008/06/09/2008-06-09_barack_obama_gets_poor_fashion_marks_aft.html