Brighton Museum celebrates the contribution of the Little Black
Dress to women’s lives with an exhibition charting the history of
this iconic garment, curated by leading fashion designer Andrew
Fionda (of the label Pearce II Fionda).
Designers from haute couture to the high street have contributed
dresses of all kinds. Many have personal resonance for the rich
and famous.
Star items include
* Ben de Lisi’s red carpet dress for Kate Winslet
* Julien MacDonald’s flowing creation worn by Victoria Beckham in
That Extra Half Inch
* Anouska Hempel’s dramatic puff ball, modelled by Hilary Swank in
Tatler
* stage costumes from 1930s musical star Adelaide Hall, and
Brighton’s 21st century drag celebrity, Dave Lynn
* favourite outfits of Zoe Ball, Joanna Lumley and Joan Collins
* a John Galliano design donated by Lady Sally Albemarle, a regular
on best dressed lists in New York and London
Japanese fashion: It’s more than meets the eye.
Conceived by acclaimed artist Hiroshi Sugimoto, this special
exhibition spotlights the sculptural essence of contemporary
Japanese fashion through the works of Rei Kawakubo, Issey
Miyake, Yohji Yamamoto, and others. Debuting alongside the
21 innovative creations of these celebrated designers are four
never-before-seen black-and-white photographs by Sugimoto
that capture the garments’ shadows, lines, and fullness of
form.
On view exclusively at the Asian Art Museum, this is the first
major exhibition to combine the collective talents of such
leading Japanese fashion luminaries with new work by
Hiroshi Sugimoto, one of today's most compelling artists.
The garments—borrowed from the Kyoto Costume Institute,
one of the world's leading repositories of haute couture—date
from 1983 to 2007, and include a range of materials and
methods from various seasons...all "with textures, colors, and
shapes worthy of definition as sculpture."
There is an exhibit at the Musee des arts decoratifs that
I am hoping to view while in Paris this January/February.
It sounds quite interesting and I have never been to this
museum before so it should be quite a treat.
From the museum website:
EXHIBITION
Christian Lacroix.
Histoires de Mode
8 November 2007 - 20 April 2008
The Musée de la Mode et du Textile invited Christian
Lacroix to become the curator and historian he wanted to be
when he studied art history at the Ecole de Louvre before
embarking on his internationally acclaimed career in haute
couture. For over a year, he immersed himself in the museum’s
collections of costumes and accessories. The result is an atypical
exhibition in which Christian Lacroix gives us his own personal
vision of the history of fashion. For a few months the garments
he selected from a heritage stretching back over several centuries
will encounter the haute-couture creations of one of the greatest
names of French fashion.
