MAC Style Black

INTRODUCING M·A·C STYLE BLACK
FROM TOWERING INK-JET BEEHIVE AND EYELINER TO STEVEN “80S” SPROUSE-IN-THE-HOUSE KOHL AND FRINGE, TO STREET-SMART LONDON NEW GOTH, BLACK IS SIMPLY BEYOND!

The ever-overlapping worlds of Fashion and Art may choose to revel in a Technicolour dream or a day-glo fantasy from time to time, but deep down, as Amy Winehouse likes to say in her wicked, wobbly way, it’s always “Back to Black.”

We first saw it in Milan for Jil Sander, in the spectacular living sculptures Raf Simmons chiseled from supple, constructed ebony curves and seams, each with an occasional fiery ruffle and flourish. We loved it at Calvin Klein, in boxy structures that echoed artist Richard Serra's epic shapes in their steely, outright boldness, eyelashes like the black widow spiders of sculptor Louise Bourgeois' sexy, sinister giant tarantulas....She mates, and she kills! And we were bouncing like black espresso beans at the New Goth youthquake we saw stomping down the runway at Gareth Pugh in London – the black market equivalent of a boot-leg Clash LP, all slick black vinyl and cool indignation. Quite simply the most intriguing new take on what "Goth" can be in the New Century, the Modern Black-o-Sphere.

Enter the NEW GOTH, a hybrid of Fashion and Art, and a fixture on the glamorous, modern gallery scene. No longer a ghoul, but a sophisticated, international creature with makeup that changes the mood to permanent midnight around the clock. M·A·C calls it STYLE BLACK.

Lips, nails, eyes, there’s no more dramatic way to declare your desire, separate your sensibility, celebrate your sexual magnetism. Something's smoldering. Mad, bad and delirious. Danger boy. Androgynous girl. Explicitly erotic, whip-smart exotic, and in-your-face expressive. Wicked ideas, archly executed with a slash of Greasepaint Stick and a slightly-curled upper lip.

How to begin? With skin perfected and purified, whitened and brightened, virgin-pure, clean and chaste. Use M·A·C Volcanic Ash Exfoliator and the Volcanic Ash Thermal Mask to smooth skin into obsidian perfection. The eruption will rock you – these are essential earth elements, modern alchemy – to prep and prime the canvas for the Dark Knight Power of Style Black.

How Goth will you go? Your choice. You can ‘Paint it BLACK’ a la L'Wren Scott, the uber-stylist turned designer who may just have created the best little black dress collection in the world. Her own personal ‘Morticia’ lash and ebony eyeliner an essential accoutrement... where there's smoke, there's ire! Twilight will bring it out in you! Or, if you choose, opt for something subtle, allude to the dark side without crossing over; flirt with a little danger, or simply satisfy a secret craving for a tiny taste of darkling drama.... there's a Style Black technique for every attitude, and you can take it where you want to.

The Style Black trend in makeup picked up steam as the fashion machine gathered momentum around the globe. M·A·C artist innovation made it happen backstage, as the Pro Team ventured into the deep end of the dark view with new M·A·C signature shades. From Charlotte Tilbury's night-charm way with Glimmerglass in Bling Black at Donna Karan; to Pep Gay's Cinderfella androgynous Eye Shadow, bewitching with a touch of Blue Flame for Vivienne Westwood; to Polly Osmond's dramatic use of the season's indispensable Greasepaint Stick on the runway in the exotic milieu of designer Yigal Azrouel. CNC Costume Nationale was the inked with pen-ultimate Style Black. Even fast and furious Diesel got into the neo-Goth night crawler, distressed just the right way, with the smoldering look of M·A·C Black Knight Lipstick paired with the dare of a Blackware Glimmerglass.

What's in it for you? Pure seduction. A little... or a lot! They WILL surrender to a Blackfire Glimmerglass for lips with depth and hot-fire smolder; Rapidblack Penultimate Eyeliner, the epitome of spontaneous, undone eroticism; and if you're naughty but not attempting haughty, the hot scratch of Baby Goth Girl Nail Lacquer is all it takes. From 18 to 88, anyone with a dark desire can take the trend by the hand and completely nail it. Style Black is a way of life, a shadowy and mysterious figure of fantasy, even for just one dark and dangerous night.

It's nice to be pretty, but it's so much more fabulous and interesting to be a Persona. Something once out-of-grasp has, through the power of makeup artistry, become thrillingly real. Black-and-white Period portraiture inspires us. Film Noir, the glamour of Hollywood, the smoking gun, is thrilling to us. Black is the beginning, the Original Seduction. And paradoxically, the simplest thing you can reach for to change your game, up the ante, start a new story – the possibilities are endless. Above all, Style Black is evanescent and artful, from Bette Davis Eyes to Andy Warhol's Factory Girls (and boys). No tribute to the modern Gallery Scene, and its fascinating cast of black-clad kooks, conspirators, and brooding, contemplative geniuses, would be complete without an after-midnight Black-Out....Grab your Edie Sedgwick eyeliner and come to the party! Style Black is everything and nothing – it's all any girl needs this season, maybe ever.

Lips, nails, eyes – there’s no more dramatic way
to declare your desire, separate your sensibility,
celebrate your magnetism. They WILL surrender
to a Blackfire Glimmerglass, Rapidblack Penultimate
Eye Liner, a slash of Greasepaint Stick, and the
hot scratch of Baby Goth Girl Nail Lacquer. Style
Black is a way of life, a shadowy and mysterious
figure of fantasy, even for just one dark and
dangerous night.

Cremesheen Lipstick
Black Knight Creamy true black
Suggested Retail Price $14.00 U.S./$16.50 CDN

Mattene Lipstick
Night Violet Deep purple grape
Midnight Media Dense matte black
Suggested Retail Price $14.50 U.S./$17.50 CDN

Glimmerglass
Bling Black Sheer black with gold pearl
Blackfire Sheer black with pinkish purple pearl
Blackware Creamy true black
Suggested Retail Price $18.00 U.S./$21.50 CDN

Mineralize Eye Shadow
Cinderfella Mineralize black with silver pearl (frost)
Gilt By Association Mineralize black with gold bronze pearl (frost)
Blue Flame Mineralize black with blue pearl (frost)
Young Punk Mineralize black with pinkish purple pearl (frost)
Suggested Retail Price $19.50 U.S./$23.50 CDN

Nail Lacquer
Seriously Hip Black with gold particle pearl
Baby Goth Girl Black with pinkish purple pearl
Nocturnelle Black as night black
Suggested Retail Price $12.00 U.S./$14.50 CDN

Brush
214 Short Shader
Suggested Retail Price $23.00 U.S./$27.50 CDN

Eye Kohl
Smolder Intense black
Suggested Retail Price $14.50 U.S./$17.50 CDN

Penultimate Eye Liner
Rapidblack True black
Suggested Retail Price $16.50 U.S./$20.00 CDN

Greasepaint Stick Intense black
Suggested Retail Price $17.50 U.S./$21.00 CDN

Available
North America September 24th, 2009 at all M·A·C
locations, 1.800.588.0070 and www.maccosmetics .com
International October 2009 at all M·A·C locations,
1.800.588.0070 and www.maccosmetics .com

Q & A WITH TERRY BARBER M·A·C SENIOR ARTIST

Q: IS “GOTH” back? or “NEW GOTH”? What’s it all about now?
A: Yes, but it’s the way Tim Burton would treat Goth, more dark-romantic, a bit of street-urchin Victoriana, but not a ghoul, a bit Ska - those are the elements of Goth now. Think punk-inspired but not punk– more punk couture. In a way it’s very Picasso-esque: raw, drawing lines around the eye with spontaneity and naivety, more home-made, distressed, lived-in looks. Black is also looking a lot more air-brushed like YSL models in the ‘80s; that famous Helmut Newton picture of the woman in the smoking jacket under the Paris street lamp – that’s a part of it too.

Q: ‘Style Black’ is so iconic. From ‘80s Steven Sprouse to the Mudd Club to The Factory to Neo-Goth Gareth Pugh – it’s a very storied idea. What elements of the new ‘Style Black’ make it modern? Is there a different technique or product you use?
A: Well back then, it was about stealing your sister’s eyeliner and really a black pencil and talc for the skin was about all you could afford. Everybody aspired to be underground didn’t they? They still do. In all those places, the way men would put a bit of kohl in the eye and not pay attention to it, let it run.... that was the spirit. Now it’s Kate Moss coming FROM a party, with a glass of champagne in one hand and a cigarette in the other, as opposed to the try hard, red-carpet GOING TO a party scene. Style Black could turn up anywhere, but its real soul is in an irreverent look of a cool, undone girl. For technique, after greasepaint stick, add a bit of gloss to the eye and let it go.... that’s now.

Q: What’s on your ‘Style Black’ mood board? In your opinion, what beauty icon had the best ‘Style Black’ look?
A: The Ronettes and other ‘50s and ‘60s girl groups, old black-and-white pictures of Tallulah Bankhead and her quote, "I’m as pure as the driven slush," The Blitz Kids, Post-Punk, early New Romantics, CBGBs and Club Taboo (London)….In terms of beauty icons I would say the pictures of Sophia Loren in the film El Cid – completely opposite to the pious character she plays, she’s got on perfect ‘60s eyeliner and those unbelievable lashes; Debbie Harry, but the early years, in her school girl uniform, before the peroxide. Of course, Kate (Bush or Moss).

Q: Did Amy Winehouse rock the modern world with her black beehive and kohl eyeliner the same way Edie Sedgwick rocked the Warhol years? What’s the fascination with ‘Back to Black’?
A: Every generation has to have its anti-establishment heroines – and we need an alternative to red-carpet perfection! Amy is like a mythical witch who lives in the Camden Underworld. She’s got a lot of Russ Meyer in her – very "Faster Pussycat, Kill, Kill"– she can do no wrong for me. Edie was great, more like a boy, all eyes and brow, more temporary and then gone in a flash.

Q: Can anybody take a Greasepaint Stick or Kohl Eyeliner and make it work? What’s the secret?
A: Yes. Because that’s the reality of how they do it, how we wear make up – quick, fast, sexy, rubbed-in black. Perfect but imperfect, wrong but right. Naïve but knowingly placed.

Q: What are your favorite Style Black products?
A: First and foremost, the Greasepaint Stick – it’s thick and crude but the lines are beautiful, it’s crude with craft! It does it all. Put it on first. That’s important. I also love the new Mineralize Black Shadows, with the undertones of jewel metallics, for that Grace Jones look – like wet asphalt. Sexy. Overall, it’s all about Black with metallics – emerald green on dirty gold, a little cobalt mixed in. Pure perfection can be dull, as Pam Anderson always taught me, trash down is much more chic

Q: How do you use Style Black from Day to Night?
A: Never change an eye from day to night, just charge it up! Polish the skin, buff the lip, shade the face but keep it all in perspective and never try too hard.

Q: If the emphasis is on a dark eye, how do you approach lips and cheeks?
A: Only a hardcore vampire would do all black everything. It’s all about balance. A lot of eye always means less skin and a fleshy mouth. A strong lip looks contemporary on a nude eye. It’s is all about what you ERASE on the face. At the shows erased eyebrows are having a big moment.

Q: What worked best backstage from New York, London, Milan and Paris, over and over? How did you interpret the new ‘Goth’ idea in makeup – how far did you want to take it?
A: Black lip glosses went on eyelids at the shows, for that petrol puddle look. Fabulous. Again, Greasepaint Stick and the black lip glosses were a killer combination. Normally you have to build and build with a pencil and eyeliner on top then layer shadows...this just STAYS. You don’t have to blend it or powder it down or retouch it; the amazing thing about these new products is the low maintenance factor. They LAST and they STAY. It’s ease with instant impact. It’s cool but not technical.

Q: M·A·C has always been all about Black.... Is black forever?
A: Without a doubt. There are so many incarnations that go into it – the biggest statement doesn’t always have to be Rock’n’Roll or Gothic. The Film Noir and 1930’s surrealism are a huge influence. I love Anita Ekberg in La Dolce Vita, and all the Italian Neo-Realist films and Fellini of course. The Egyptians – Amy Winehouse brought Nefertiti to the street. That cubist, round-eyed Cabaret look and the chic Lesbiana of the 20s; Josephine Baker! Helmut Newton and that whole Robert Palmer 80’s mannequin thing that we can’t seem to escape from!

Q: Can women AND men wear ‘Style Black’?
A: Sure but it’s really a Soho thing. Or suburban boys on the weekend escaping the nine to five. Think Pete Doherty doing bridge and tunnel.