How Coco Became Chanel

Orphaned at a young age, Chanel made a living as a simple seamstress and cabaret performer. She earned the nickname "Coco" after one of the nightly songs she performed for drunken soldiers.
Her rags-to-riches story was widely unknown—as her fame grew, Chanel kept her modest childhood a secret. Her transformative journey is revealed in Coco Before Chanel, a French film starring Audrey Tautou in limited release beginning Friday, September 25, 2009.
"She was really quite a radical person," says Valerie Steele, director of The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City and author of Women of Fashion. "She grew up very poor—a kept woman who didn't want to just be somebody's mistress. She identified with wealthy men. She wanted to have the independence that they had."
The classic black-and-white palette, menswear-inspired design and simple elegance of the Chanel revered today are what made her a rebel in the 1920s and 30s. "She rejected a lot of the feminine styles of her day and created a kind of androgynous style," Steele says. "In a way, she was the first female dandy, which I think is still very powerfully modern."
The press could not get enough of her rebellious style. The Chanel brand thrived until economic depression and the outbreak of World War II caused her business to close in 1939. Chanel returned with a legendary fashion show in 1954, and in her 70s, she revived her brand to the influential status it holds to this day.
Steele credits the lasting Chanel legacy to the fashion house's current head designer, Karl Lagerfeld, who brought the label up-to-date in 1984. "He started using different materials like denim; he started exaggerating different features like the buttons and the double Cs," Steele says. "In many ways, Chanel would probably be rolling over in her grave in horror. On the other hand, that was necessary to make it relevant. He has certainly been brilliant in staying with the Chanel DNA, but then giving it shocks to make it modern."
As Chanel is often quoted, "Fashion passes, style remains." Even a woman who has never owned a Chanel piece is likely to have something inspired by the iconic designer.

The Brady Bunch Hour

"SEX AND ART ARE THE SAME THING"

I bet your mother would be proud of you

Picasso Inspired by Hentai

Fans of "Samurai Champloo" might recall an early episode where we learn that the historic artist Vincent Van Gogh was inspired by Japanese Ukiyo-e art. Now it turns out that he wasn't the only world renowned painter to be inspired by art from Japan- Pablo Picasso was as well. Only the art that inspired Picasso was a little more... revealing. That's right, Picasso was a hentai fan.

An art exhibition in Barcelona is showcasing the works that inspired Picasso to become the infamous painter he was. It turns out the man had quite a few Japanese prints in his personal collection. 19 erotic works, to be exact. The most notable of his private collection is the world famous Hokusai Katsushika piece "Dream of the Fisherman's Wife," otherwise known as the first ever tentacle hentai drawing. Picasso loved the piece so much that he painted his own version of it in 1903.

YAYOI KUSAMA, the Polka Dot Princess

"pain and passion"

Once when asked what to do with her body when she dies, Frida replied: "Burn it…I don't want to be buried. I have spent too much time lying down…Just burn it!"

On the day after her death, mourners gathered at the crematorium to witness the cremation of Mexico's greatest and most shocking painter. Soon to be an international icon, Frida Kahlo knew how to give her fans one last unforgettable goodbye. As the cries of her admirers filled the room, the sudden blast of heat from the open incinerator doors caused her body to bolt upright. Her hair, now on fire from the flames, blazed around her head like a halo. Frida's lips seemed to break into a seductive grin just as the doors closed. Her last diary entry read: "I hope the end is joyful - and I hope never to return - Frida.".