MSCHF is selling empty shopping bags

The latest drop of MSCHF (66th, to be exact) is intended to give an illusion of wealth. The controversial Brooklyn-based art collective, which has made itself famous around the world for having a range of products ranging from plug-ins to sneakers, social channels to the sword sported by Grimes on the red carpet of the 2021 Met Gala, has launched an e-store where you can buy high-end designer bags, such as Fendi, Hermès, Burberry and Rolex, at a price of $40 each, under the motto that all those who are preparing to make the social climb are repeated daily "fake it, until you make it."

Many will wonder why someone would spend $40 in a plastic bag with the Supreme logo on it, but in reality the collective has done nothing but focus on a phenomenon that has been rampant on the web for some time and that for the habitué of the platforms of resale are completely familiar, on Ebay, Depop, Vinted and Vestiare retailers are offering these items at crazy prices (20 euros for a cardboard envelope with Saint Laurent written on? Really?).

"If you can't consume - and you know you can't, or at least not at the level you crave, not at the level you've been fed by social media and the mediated fiction of celebrity existence - you can aspire less to achieve the aesthetics of the consumer", says the OnlyBags manifesto, which in addition to big brands also sells bags of brands that are not really a status symbol, such as Sephora, IKEA and Victoria's Secret. So what exactly are these empty designer bags for? To be shown, flaunted on social networks, carried around the streets to arouse the envy of passers-by, in a capitalist society where the only real secret of happiness seems to be money, these bags will make others believe that you have it. Mschf's manifesto describes the aesthetics and psychology of consumption that we have been spoon-fed through the media: bags have little practical or physical value, but the value of the designed logos placed on is priceless.

One wonders if the brands used to build this meta reflection will cause a new wave of legal problems for the collective, given that already the release of the Air Max 97 "Satan", the sneakers created with Lil Nas X and containing a drop of blood human (from MSCHF team members) in the sole, MSCHF had cost her a complaint from Nike for copyright infringement. But the legal problems didn't stop the group of artists, who ironically decided to find a new target for their satire in the pop culture icon par excellence: Mickey Mouse. The new drop, which will remain top secret until January 2024 - the date on which the copyright of Mickey Mouse will become public, giving the possibility to anyone who wants it to be able to use it without any legal repercussions - aims to circumvent the rules of intellectual property and in wait it is possible to buy an NFT sarcastically called Famous Mouse which will entitle buyers to receive the collectible as soon as copyright laws fall. The real goal of MSCHF is not so much to desecrate the intellectual property of others, but to underline the backwardness of the laws that regulate the modern concept of intellectual property, with the aim of subverting the canons and laws of today's fashion through irony. and creativity, deconstructing the status and value of those totems, considers them “untouchable” in a sort of iconoclastic war against today's idols of capitalism, through irreverence and provocation.