The first joy was the documentary, Valentino: The Last Emperor. The clothes were so exquisite; his relationship with his 45-year partner in both business and life was so loving; and the chance to spend an hour and a half with truly European sensibilities was such a joy. 

I found something else interesting: the night before we saw this film, William and I had gone to another really lovely movie, Sugar,  about a Dominican player who comes to the States to play on a farm team and shoot for the stars. His mother worked in a textile factory, and even the tiny scene that showed her working conditions was sad. When the mother mentioned later in the film that Sugar’s sister would also be working in the factory—“but just part-time”—there were audible “Ohhhhs” because no one in the audience wanted that for her. The seamstresses in Valentino’s wardrobe rooms were something else again: sewing by hand as an art form, working with the finest materials, creating something extraordinary. 

That’s something I want to apply in my own life: making every task creative and expressive, even when the same task done in some other mode could be seen very differently.

Later on, we went downtown to see Rev. Billy and The Church of Life After Shopping, with the church of Stop Shopping Gospel Choir. You may know of Rev. Billy from the documentary film What Would Jesus Buy? Rev. Billy and the choir are a combination of performance art, comedy, music, and a serious message about rampant consumerism. The Church of Life After Shopping preaches a gospel of supporting small businesses, celebrating neighborhoods and seeing them as important economic entities, and protecting small children from the glut of advertising aimed just at them.

On the one hand, it seemed that Valentino, the Last Emperor, whose life has been about haute couture, outfitting the super-rich, and living in a style anyone would describe as opulent, was the opposite of Rev. Billy and his message of simplicity, frugality, and finding meaning in what money can’t buy. And yet there an interesting intersection of values in these two experiences. In the Valentino documentary, we see the design company sold in 2002 and twice since, and Giancarlo Giametti, Valentino’s business partner and life partner, lamented the “bottom line” fixation of the corporate buyers. “We never ran the business like that,” he said. “All I wanted was for him to create beautiful clothes, and to be famous, and be happy.” I’ll bet even Rev. Billy—choir members pictured below—would approve.