8 - Pattern Books II

Summary

Pattern books provided guidelines for how to make garments. Chapter 8 explores approaches to the problem posed by physical intimacy between the normatively male tailor and a female client in a social and political climate characterized by avoidance of sex. Drawing the body in this environment was necessary to providing instructions but presented graphic artists with a huge challenge. A comparison of lessons in ‘how to take a measurement’ in the Mao years shows that this challenge sometimes proved too much. During the Cultural Revolution, images of women were occasionally omitted from pattern books altogether. Under these circumstances, the zhifu had virtually no competition.