RSSOn Painting, Fashion, Love and Old Minks: A Sheepish Interview with Ellis Avery
05 Jan 2012 No Comments
in beauty, dresses, eco, green, jewelry /accessories, literature, Uncategorized Tags: Alison Bechdel, Bloch, Chaparral, David Mitchell, Ellis Avery, Jill Anderson, L.C. Shaine, Tamara de Lempicka, Victorias Secret
I first met Ellis Avery at Columbia University, where we were both reading theses for graduating students a couple of years ago. We hit it off immediately–not just because we were on exactly the same page (literally and figuratively) about the student manuscript in question, but because, as it turns out, we are both Japanophiles and historical novel enthusiasts who have spent most of our writing lives more or less stuck in the past two centuries. Oh, and she has a really groovy sense of style, which is always a plus in the dusty halls of the Writing Division.
When Ellis told me about her first novel–The Tea House Fire–I was downright thrilled, since it sounded like precisely the sort of novel I love to read and strive to write. When she sent me a copy I was even more thrilled, because (guess what?) it was precisely the sort of novel I love to read and strive to write. Lyrically and lushly written, fueled by Ellis’s soaring imagination and meticulous research, it provided both a window into a fascinating period in Japan’s history (the Meiji era) and an intriguing element of its culture (the tea ceremony). It also provided inspiration as I soldiered on with my own novel about Japan, which is set many decades later but explores some overlapping themes.
Not surprisingly we stayed in touch, and when Ellis told me about a year ago she had another historical novel coming out this month I was thrilled yet again–particularly when she told me it was set in Paris (which is where I set a good part of my first novel) and is about both painting and fashion. I was lucky enough to get an advance copy of The Last Nude from Ellis too, and found it to be absolutely mesmerising: a darkly-erotic tale of art, painting and love between the artist Tamara de Lempicka and her muse Rafaela. In fact, it swept me away so much that it was only after reading it that I realized (duh) that between the great writing in her work, the mesmerising history and the careful attention to certain Chanel-style dresses, Ellis was the perfect candidate for a Sheepish interview. And so I approached her, and she said yes. And guess what? I’m completely thrilled. Again. 
So without further Sheepish add, here we go…
****
SF: Who is the best-dressed character you’ve created? How did you come up with and dress them? What does the way you dress them say about them to you?
EA: My best-dressed character is Rafaela, the young seamstress who models for the Art Deco painter Tamara de Lempicka in my new novel The Last Nude, due out on January 5th, 2012 (Sheepish aside: that’s today, folks!) from Riverhead Books.
[The book itself. Note: the picture is actually one of a series Lempicka did on "The Beautiful Rafaela."]
At the beginning of the novel, which takes place in 1927 Paris, Tamara is the artist and Rafaela is the muse. Over the course of the book, however, Rafaela discovers that she’s an artist too, albeit in the trivialized and demoted art of fashion. Rafaela begins this novel, which is very much a story about coming into one’s own, in a dress that she made by copying a pattern from Chanel, but by the end she has created a new dress from scratch, one that works a zipper into its design: this is an idea Rafaela comes up with on her own, long before she ever encounters a dress with a zipper by Schiaparelli or anyone else. Rafaela’s initial, Chanel-inspired dress is a form-fitting little number made of dazzling teal-blue raw silk, while the zipper dress that ends the book is an A-line piece made of slate-colored gabardine with darker gray piping. Rafaela’s zipper dress is designed to draw as much attention to its own construction as it does to its wearer: this is a novel about learning to depend on one’s art rather than one’s body.
[Sheepish aside: couldn't find anything quite like that online, but I did find this super-cute zipper-dress by Parker, though it is sadly sold out.]
[Actually, she sorta looks like a Tamara Lempicka painting, doesn't she?]
I also found zipper boots:
…zipper jewelry…..
…and a random Facebook page, apparently for zipper fans only: Unnecessary Zippers/Buttons on Clothes Are Totally Badass. Who knew?
SF: How would you describe your personal style? How about your writing style? Is there any connection between the two in your mind?
EA: I didn’t see a connection until you asked, but I strive for sturdy, lush minimalism in both. I work as hard to craft a plot that builds to a satisfying bang in my novels as I do to use the fewest and punchiest possible syllables in my haiku, but I’m striving to do both using phrases that enter the reader’s mind with effortless grace. (Of course, whether I succeed or not is another story.)
[Sheepish aside: She does.]
Similarly, I wear minimal jewelry—the band my partner Sharon gave me, my late mother’s engagement diamond on a chain—but I have a drawerful of gorgeous scarves. I’ll wear a cute but unfussy dress over a pair of black jeans any day. I have arthritis in my feet, which means I wear cloddier shoes than I’d like to, but even if I didn’t, I’d probably pad around in black ballet flats.
[Ellis]
[Bloch ballet flats. (Best.Flats. Ever.)]
SF: Who is your favorite author? Designer?
EA: Favorite author: for sly humor, pitch-perfect historical detail, and enviable concision, Penelope Fitzgerald. For wringing a virtuosic amount of suspense out of one quiet relationship, Marilynne Robinson. For nonstop imaginative fireworks, David Mitchell.
[Sheepish Aside:Doesn't he look explosive? Actually, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob Dezoet may be one of my favorite novels, like, ever. Cloud Atlas is next on my list...]
Favorite designer: for magnificence of construction, mid-century Balenciaga. For sheer fun, sixties Courrèges. But for real? Jill Anderson, at 331 East 9th Street in the East Village.
[Jill Anderson Dress, $350]
[Jill Anderson herself]
[Star Fleet Commander Uhuru. A little stewardess, a little rock'n roll, a lot Star Trek.]
SF: What books are on your nightstand?
EA: Currently? Sonya Chung’s novel Long For This World. An ARC of Alyssa Harad’s memoir Coming To My Senses. And Alison Bechdel’s Best American Comics 2011.
SF: What beauty/cosmetic products are on your bureau or in your medicine cabinet (just a few is fine)?
EA: Roxana Villa’s lovely beeswax-based solid fragrance, Chaparral, which I encountered through perfumista Alyssa Harad: it smells like sage and eucalyptus. My mother’s topaz earrings. Also, every Christmas I used to give my mother a great Vitamin E clear lipstick from Face Stockholm—colorless, just a little shine—and now, sadly, they’re all mine.
[Chaparral Natural Solid Perfume Compact, $25 on Etsy]
SF: If you could take just one book, one pair of shoes/boots and one clothing item to a desert island, what would they each be?
EA: I would take some sort of desert island survival guide, or a blank book for taking notes on what hadn’t killed me so far. Or maybe Annie Dillard’s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, both to help me develop a better attitude toward my desert island fate and for inexhaustible reading pleasure. [Sheepish aside: LOVE that book!] I’d bring my old-man arthritis shoes, of course. Only one piece of clothing, for real? A really good bra, I guess: I can make a grass skirt, but why bother surviving on a desert island if you have constant back pain?
[Victoria's Secret Black Fantasy Diamond Bra, $5 million. (I mean, if you're gonna do it, do it right, right?)]
But assuming we had the underwear situation squared away, maybe a voluminous denim dress. It would be durable and protect me from the elements, and I could tear off strips to make a fish trap.
SF: What do you wear when you’re writing?
EA: A dress over jeans, in general. But when I was first drafting The Last Nude, set in decadent 1920s Paris, I wore a strand of pearls my mother gave me, which she had received in turn from her own mother, my Nana. Born in 1920 and one of the most glamorous people I’ve ever known, my Nana died in January, 2008, and I drafted The Last Nude in June through December of the same year. I inherited her fur coat. Even though those minks died before I was born, I’ve never worn out of the house, because it sends a message I don’t want to send. But when it gets cold, I’ll go ahead and write in my grandmother’s fur coat; I love it.
[Poor lil' guy...my Nana used to wear a couple of these--with claws and ears intact--around her neck. Needless to say, not something you'd want to snuggle up with while writing....]
SF: What’s your go-to distraction (online or off) when you have writer’s block or are just feeling lazy?
EA: Email. Facebook. Twitter. Making a cup of tea.
SF: What are you working on now?
EA: I have a new novel glimmering on the horizon, but I’m currently working on a series of personal essays, most currently one about selling my mother’s gold in the Diamond District last month, five months after her death this past June.
SF: What’s your next big fashion purchase? Next literary purchase?
EA: I have a fabulous Jazz Agey-looking bead-and-sequin confection lined up for the launch of The Last Nude, so I’ve got my eyes open for a flapper headband to top it off.
[Fabulous flapper mini-headband-wrap, sold on Etsy]
I know there’s a play, Tamara based on certain racy episodes in the life of Tamara de Lempicka, the painter who inspired The Last Nude, but I only recently realized that the play was based on a 1989 novel of the same name by L. C. Shaine, so that’s definitely next.
[Fin]
So there it is: the fabulous Ellis Avery on her fabulous (and as fellow novelist Emily Barton noted, “smoking hot”) book The Last Nude. Go buy it. Now. And then come back in a few days for that long-forgotten post on Aztec prints (and Aztec historical novels) that I keep promisin’ ….happy reading!
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