I was swiping on Instagram (brain-rotting my summer away) when I saw a post from The Perfect Magazine captioned ‘Dua Lipa channelling her inner Carrie Bradshaw’. It was a carousel with pics of Dua Lipa, who is peacefully enjoying her world-famous pop star-esque summer, next to pictures of Carrie’s outfit from the original (and the only canon) SATS.

My thought: Is Dua Lipa channelling her inner Carrie?  Is she actually? Or is she just having a fun time putting together outfits and using the caption and pictures comparing her to Carrie, is simply a tool to get more traction online?

First of all, there are a lot of other 80s and 90s TV show icons that Dua or any other modern celebrity can be compared to. At this point, give TV show Carrie and Patricia Field a day off; their legacy is already being actively destroyed with every new And Just Like That episode (no more, thankfully). And if you must compare modern celebs to 90s icons, Ziwe and Hilary Banks from The Fresh Prince are right there.

To be honest, the similar outfits in question were not even that similar. Carrie wore a pink top, and so did Dua. So did probably three hundred other people that day. I am not sure if Dua’s intention really was to pay homage to the SATS character, but to me, it literally looks like she was just dressed in a cute, somewhat trendy outfit. If anything, this is more of a commentary on the cyclical nature of fashion that keeps trying to draw inspiration from its past self than it is on Dua Lipa and Carrie Bradshaw.

And I understand SATS is trending now. The 90s are back, and we’re recreating Samantha’s daring use of red, Miranda’s (miwaandwaa, sorry, couldn’t help it) office core, Charlotte’s simple yet sexy silhouettes and Carrie’s chaotic fashion. So yes, comparing Dua (a modern icon) to Carrie (an icon in her own right) is clickable and readable. I mean, it made me pause my day to write a story about it. But is it really necessary? Because more than pausing my day, it frankly just pissed me the fuck off.

Why must we compare and ‘get inspired’ by the past? Why can’t we just be original? Or, why can’t we just welcome repetition based on the simple truth that there’s nothing new under the sun, instead of pawning it off as some homage bs and overflowing the internet with ‘who wore it better’ edits (another pointless consequence of the cyclical nature of EVERYthing)?

People dissect music videos and photo shoots, trying to see what famous 60s / 70s, 80s, 90s, or 00s art, style, or concept they were inspired by, while simultaneously missing the part where they’re supposed to appreciate and enjoy the final product. We’re so focused on catching the reference that we begin to miss the point altogether. We can appreciate a pop star’s music video, a Met Gala outfit, and Dua Lipa’s summer fits while honouring the references and seeing how they created a whole new beautiful thing.

When did we lose touch with the present and decide that the only way to create art (or even content) that will garner attention is to wrap it in references to the past? And at what point did we make it a rule to group works that might carry completely different meanings but share similarities with the past iterations of the same genre together?

This way of thinking is problematic to me for two reasons. It forces creatives into a box where they have to sprinkle in past references in order to garner more press or attention towards their work. It also takes original works and strips them of their originality, turning them into an homage. Therefore, we don’t really progress. How can we move forward and progress as a creative community if all we do is talk about the past?

To put it in other words, everyone wants new shit, but the second something even remotely new comes along, we start to look for signs it was inspired by the old. So wtf should the artists do?

I know works reference each other all the time, styles develop from each other, concepts blend, and new is just a retelling of the old, but fuck, at least it’s somewhat new.

Maybe it’s the digital age of it all. Maybe the reason we hyper-analyse content more than ever before is the quick and easy access we have to all the references we are trying to spot. So the question becomes: is it about the repetition and recycling of concepts, or the opportunity to not only break down and analyse the content, but also share your findings faster than ever before?

There is also this small issue of, let’s call it, confirmation bias. If one video of a creator spotting all the ’80s references in a music video goes viral, all everyone will be able to see are those references, ignoring any sort of originality. Plus, if that video goes viral, others will likely want to recreate similar content in hopes of it going viral also.

That makes me think, are we to blame? We are so obsessed with nostalgia that we eat up the content that references anything of the ‘back in the days’ variety. So what choice do magazines, writers and creators have but to make content that includes element of nostalgia? And what choice do artists have but to use it as a selling point?

I am honestly not sure where I am going with all this. I know that there are things out there that are completely singular. Not inspired by anything, they are farm-to-table, from the artist’s mind straight into public consumption. But those are the things you need to actively seek out. They will not be on the covers of legacy magazines or in the top 10 most-watched lists.

I just hope we can fix that. Maybe stop paying homage and start appreciating things that are so out of the box and new that there is not even a name for them. And even if those things somewhat resemble the past, let’s call them natural continuations instead of reminiscences.