Emmalea Russo’s debut novel, Vivienne, is a fashion lover’s dream.
Did Vivienne Volker kill Wilma Lang? That’s the question on everybody’s lips throughout Emmalea Russo’s debut novel, Vivienne. Published through Arcade in September 2024, it follows a week in the life of the infamous surrealist artist Vivienne Volker as she deals with the consequences of her murderous controversy.
Vivienne is equally as spine-chilling as it is tantalizing —he perfect novel for lovers of the macabre. Russo seamlessly weaves images of surrealist art and otherworldly fashion with the starkly modern concept of an artist’s public perception on the Internet. Russo does not shy away from artistic references, creating an almost cinematically rich world for the reader. Martin Margiela, Rick Owens, and even Carolyn Bessette Kennedy all had a hand in fleshing out the novel’s deliciously fashionable world.
I had the pleasure of catching up with Emmalea Russo to talk all about her inspirations for Vivienne and her favorite things in the art and fashion world.
This interview has been edited for content and clarity.
Kaitlin Owens: Vivienne Volker's work seems to be part surrealist sculpture, part mixed media painting/fashion/video. Is there any artist in particular that served as inspiration for her career?
Emmalea Russo: From the jump, the character [of] Vivienne Volker had her own peculiar energy — singular and quirky. A manic and controversial portrait of Vivienne is formed, in the beginning of the novel, from public perception: comments on YouTube videos and responses to her work getting cancelled from a high-profile exhibition called “Forgotten Women Surrealists.” The Internet chatter also paints a portrait of her style before we ever meet the “real” Vivienne.
Before she stopped participating in the art world, Vivienne was most well-known for her controversial “Dressing the Doll” sculptures back in the 1970s (which then made a resurgence in the present-day world of the novel). I was envisioning strange garments made for large, disfigured dolls and constructed from scrap fabrics and detritus. After leaving the art world, she works as a seamstress.
While I didn’t have a particular inspiration for Vivienne’s life and work, I did pour over comments on YouTube videos of iconic and controversial women, from Carolyn Bessette Kennedy to Camille Paglia. I was also thinking of my own grandmother, who was the most glamorous person in her small town, and my great-grandmother, who worked as a seamstress in New York City’s garment district after coming over from Italy.
KO: There seem to be references to garments made by both Rick Owens and Elena Velez in your novel (and obviously the Vivienne Westwood connection). Work by the former two designers is often described as dystopian and otherworldly, whereas Westwood errs on the more glamorous side of deconstruction. Were these purposeful choices in outlining the emotional undercurrent of Vivienne?
ER: Definitely. While writing, I looked at so much surreal artwork and vintage clothing. Like the characters in the book, I was swimming in digital images. I wanted Vivienne to feel cinematic, haunted, absurd, alive, and vivid. More than the deconstructive and glamorous dystopias of Rick Owens, Elena Velez, and Vivienne Westwood, I was looking at footage from Margiela’s Fall/Winter 1995 show in Paris. Both the clothes and the atmosphere of that show inspired the emotional energy of Vivienne.
[Margiela’s FW95 show] happened under a circus tent as a deranging waltz played. The models wore Margiela’s signature masks — faces covered, and the fabrics were black, navy blue, hot pink, red. Grimy and dystopian, but also light, playful, carnivalesque. Like a lot of ‘90s Margiela, the show achieves this mix of seriousness and silliness that I was going for in Vivienne. There are velvet dresses with puff sleeves, layered deconstructed looks, and mechanics’ jumpsuits. In the book, one of the commenters describes having seen Vivienne at that show. Martin Margiela’s own mysterious anonymity and vision were also inspiring. Like Vivienne Volker, he quit. At the end of that circus show, the models take their masks off and flit around with balloons as “A Girl Like You” plays. The only footage you can find online is damaged, crackly, and homemade — which gives the event an aura and texture of surreal memory. It happened, and it was a magical moment, and now it’s gone.
While there is a very dark and dystopian thread running through Vivienne, it’s also a love letter to art and a farewell to art. What can art be and do — separate from cults of personality, fame, affirmation, consensus? What are the risks and sacrifices required to stay true to a vision? When to compromise? When to quit?
KO: More broadly, what were your inspirations for the novel?
ER: Glimpses of how things could be: both dystopian futures where artists are instruments of the state and vessels for messaging, and rule-breaking moments of utopian worlds alongside the world of art as we know it. Paradoxical and ambiguous possibilities that burst through everyday dreariness.
In terms of clothing in the novel — I was inspired by utilitarian and familiar uniforms constantly occupied by the wearer (Lou’s work jumpsuit, Velour’s white robe, Vivienne’s long black coat) and garments as unfamiliar, ghostly, vacant. There is something haunting, uncanny, exciting about an article of clothing on the floor, or even displayed on a mannequin. Empty [garments] as both aftermath and possibility.
KO: Who are your favorite designers and artists — personally, separate from the novel?
ER: Artists and designers I always return to include Mike Kelley, Tony Oursler, Dorothea Tanning, Louise Bourgeois, Margiela, Yohji Yamamoto, Remedios Varo, Rei Kawakubo, Rita Ackermann, Andrew Wyeth, and Puppets and Puppets.
KO: What do you hope readers take away from Vivienne?
ER: I think novels are emotional, bodily experiences. So: stomach drops, weird sensations, possibilities for rebirth and spiritualization from decay, death, decline. No clear messages, lessons, or takeaways, but a sense of exhilaration. 🌀
Vivienne is now available in hardcover and as an ebook. For more information about Emmalea Russo and how to purchase the book, please visit her website, or her Substack newsletter, Cosmic Edges.
Kaitlin Owens is the Archival Fashion Editor for HALOSCOPE and the Editor-in-Chief of Dilettante. For a closer look at her work, please visit her website.