A new exhibition traces the latest developments in the world of fashion, its international influences and its increasingly comfortable relationship with the institutions of fine art.
In the past 10 years avant-garde fashion has focused on a select number of designers who produce truly innovative pieces and redefine the boundaries between fashion and art. Fashion houses such as Comme des Gar莽ons, Vivienne Westwood and Alexander McQueen consistently explore new and exciting approaches to the concept of what fashion is and the ideas the human body can present. Now, hoping to invite greater international attention for new designers beyond this core few, the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam, argues that there has never been a greater time for forward-thinking, challenging fashion designers and that the dichotomy between fashion and art has never been less clear.
The Future of Fashion is Now focuses on the immensely diverse range of directions that today鈥檚 designers, both new and those that are more established, are navigating into. With existing works from more than 60 designers from around the world, as well as special new commissions from six emerging talents, the exhibition runs the gamut from fashion for fun, fashion for ease of use, fashion as a challenge to design, to fashion which even challenges the very idea of fashion itself.
Conceived by Jos茅 Teunissen and Han Nefkens, The Future of Fashion is Now explores the huge changes and progressions of the fashion industry in recent years. Teunissen explains that now feels like the right time for the exhibition: 鈥淲e have been aware for some years that there鈥檚 a new generation, which is thinking really differently about fashion.鈥 On the one hand, she attributes changing attitudes to advances in technology which have 鈥渆mancipated people, so that more and more designers want to experiment with new kinds of material, new kinds of solutions鈥 and on the other hand to a growing awareness that the avant-garde designers 鈥渨orking on the edge of fashion鈥 have themselves become well-known pillars of the establishment. Teunissen describes people such as Rejina Pyo, Hussein Chalayan and Viktor & Rolf as 鈥渕ore conceptual, working fashion designers, who are constantly trying to renew fashion, experimenting with what it could be鈥 but these are professionals who have been challenging the status quo for a long time. The Future of Fashion is therefore also 鈥渁bout broadening our scope, looking outside Europe and maybe seeing what鈥檚 happening in China and Peru and Australia.鈥 The exhibition brings a truly international flavour to innovative fashion because 鈥渢he world has changed; every important city or region of the world has its own fashion, fashion weeks and magazines.鈥
While pieces were collected by the curators with the help of international scouts and a jury, the process of selection was deliberately non-prescriptive and the range of designs on view is a natural presentation of highly eclectic global styles. They were, however, able to break down the presentation of the exhibition into four 鈥渟ub-terms.鈥 These sections focus on Materialism (transparency, organic and technology), Carnivalesque (redefining body form and identity), Reinterpretation (journeys and explorations), and Politics and Community. This thematic curation avoids placing too much physical distinction between the previously existing works and the six commissions which were especially created for the show. The newly-created works are to be placed amongst the other works in their appropriate thematic area but will be superficially set apart with more space and explanatory text around them. Although displayed alongside many other works, these new commissions are the focal point of the exhibition and they enable the curators to highlight the new directions open to and pursued by the innovators when they are released from the industry鈥檚 commercial and financial constraints.
The six successful winners were each awarded a grant from the Han Nefkens Fashion on the Edge initiative to create a piece that they felt was important to make. To identify the recipients, Teunissen and Nefkens undertook 鈥渂ottom-up research鈥 and nurtured the designers by constantly discussing their ideas and aims. The final recipients 鈥 Craig Green (UK), Digest Design (China), D&K (Australia), Iris van Herpen (The Netherlands), Lucia Cuba (Peru) and Olek (Poland) show variety and the wider trend of fashion, rather than focusing on the established fashion capitals of London, Paris, New York and Milan. The industry is looking further afield, especially to Berlin 鈥渇or avant-garde, for margin, for new鈥 and also to Antwerp for 鈥渘ew energy, new possibility.鈥
Although these six designers were funded by Fashion on the Edge, there was no prescription for their work and they were given creative free reign over their final designs. Teunissen and Nefkens, however, encouraged a process of creative collaboration, which Teunissen describes as 鈥渁 dialogue, to stimulate them, to inspire them to control it.鈥 So while the commissions were 鈥渆specially meant to give designers the freedom to make something that they want to make that they probably wouldn鈥檛 make,鈥 the curators closely followed the progress of each designer: 鈥淚t鈥檚 not about (critiquing) them; it鈥檚 more about seeing how the process is developing, for example, and asking how something will evolve and what kind of project it is?鈥
For centuries clothes have been used, not just for practicality, but as a way of projecting an image and appearance to the rest of the world. This is one of fashion鈥檚 very strengths, the manner in which it acts as a form of sociological armour for its wearer. Teunissen describes this ability 鈥渢o communicate a personal and social identity鈥 as 鈥渢he most important aspect of fashion, for centuries.鈥 Designers such as Adele Varcoe (one of a number of those in the exhibition currently undertaking a PhD) are focusing on these sociological myths of clothing, with Varcoe directly referencing the story of the emperor鈥檚 new clothes fairytale and its message of the powerful projections of fashion. By creating several performances only body stockings are worn (including a reconstruction of a 1920s Chanel show, without the clothes) Varcoe questions 鈥渨hat is concrete and material and what is just a culture and a belief in the visual elements.鈥 Meanwhile, Forrest Jessee is taking fashion back to its most basic and exploring how clothing can be used practically and how new technologies can be manipulated to recreate comfort and protection. Jesse鈥檚 Sleep Suit is a form of 鈥渁rchitecture connecting to something you can wear,鈥 a comforting cocoon that is simple but maintains an avant-garde appeal.
Some designers have taken the possibilities and innovations of technology further still to create pieces that ostensibly seem useful and practical but which would take some stretch of the imagination to become mainstream and populist. Pauline van Dongen鈥檚 re-charging jacket, for example, certainly brings functionality to a new extreme but, while it鈥檚 doubtful that these items will ever become a commercial reality, Teunissen argues that 鈥渢he use of technology is gaining momentum 鈥 the challenge is to make a product, not a prototype.鈥 Elisa van Joolen鈥檚 work directly acknowledges both the potential of customisation and the cannibalism of fashion by reproducing a variety of crew neck sweaters from different designers into new pieces. The project acknowledges not only the similarities among many different designers鈥 ranges (鈥渆veryone has a crew neck sweater, every brand鈥) but also, once the work leaves the fashion house, it is in the public realm and out of the designer鈥檚 control. Just as red carpet fashion designers have sought over the years to have the 鈥渞ight鈥 celebrities photographed in their clothes, Teunissen explains how van Joolen found that many of the original designers 鈥渢ried to control it.鈥 However, the beauty of a garment lies not only in the way in which it hints at continued possibilities for individualism in a rather homogenous landscape: 鈥淓verything looks the same, but when you make new combinations, you see small differences in the brands; I think that鈥檚 simple but nice.鈥
Van Joolen鈥檚 work indirectly references the manner in which fashion, and our relationship to it today (the constant pursuit of the new, the revolving door of collections and the fast fashion on the high street) raises ethical issues and questions about the industry鈥檚 sustainability. Designers such as Stella McCartney and Vivienne Westwood have for years advocated a more ethical, sustainable, environmentalist attitude, but this is contradictory because they are a part of this system and the constant search for the new. Teunissen, however, sees the introduction of new technology as an opportunity to challenge this status quo. The new technologies have 鈥渙pened up space for young designers because they can start within a niche making a small-scale product and find new business models with small-scale, highly specialised, unique things; that鈥檚 valuable.鈥 While challenging the mores of consumerism, they are rising to prominence using technology that has made the bigger brands take notice. With retail giants from Burberry to Primark recognising the significance of use of social media in engaging with customers, fashion is one which embraces greater individuality both the brands for consumers.
The exhibition鈥檚 very title, The Future of Fashion is Now, identifies the insatiable search for the new that powers this global industry to constantly seek novelty and change. However, it also acknowledges that there has never before been a time like this in fashion. In defining the art form and its status today Teunissen sees the innovations in materials and technology as leading the way: 鈥淐hanging the process and also the content of fashion, making clothes that communicate with your body and present its emotions, that brings a totally different image or meaning of what fashion could be.鈥 Just as important, however, is the fact that emerging designers are starting to question and re-think the system of fashion and consumption: 鈥淢ore and more there is the ethical issue. Do we have to consume this? Don鈥檛 we have to think more about the value of what we are wearing?鈥 Teunissen calls this new ethical issue 鈥渟ustainable awareness鈥 and highlights that in many ways this need for a story, a focus on the provenance of a piece, and an awareness of the models at work in its creations, is bringing fashion closer to art. The idea of stories in a work is common in fine art but 鈥渢he specific connection to fashion, to garments, to textiles, to raise awareness of these kinds of stories, to connect people, I think that鈥檚 quite new in fashion.鈥
An example of using a garment that takes the narrative of creation and weaves it explicitly into the final work is Dutch designer, Aliki van der Kruijs鈥 Made By Rain scarves. They are dyed in indigo then literally laid out on the designer鈥檚 roof until it rains. Because it is such an organic process, and totally at the whim of nature, each piece is unique in a way that factory-made (or even hand-made) materials cannot be. Each textile comes with a card stating which date鈥檚 rain helped to create it, how strongly it fell and for how long, and this brings an element to the design that Teunissen describes as 鈥渟low fission.鈥 This focus on materiality and the process of making is echoed in Digest Design鈥檚 recent commercial fashion collection, which explores the versatility and uses of calico. Using traditional methods of dying, Digest Design (designer Dooling Jiang) has created a reconstruction from her previous collection, referencing not only 鈥渓ocal craft and local heritage reflecting China鈥檚 identity,鈥 but also the more commercial collections of fashion designers and the fusion of fashion with art by then creating something akin to an artist鈥檚 installation 鈥 a composition which Teunissen describes as 鈥渂ringing forward Chinese history, connecting it to the values of fabric.鈥 For Teunissen this story-telling is a really important element of the new direction in which fashion is moving: 鈥淲hy are we attached to clothing? What can be the story? What is relevant? It鈥檚 a different, conceptual, more art way of thinking than 10 or 20 years ago.鈥 This redefinition of values is a process that extends beyond the exhibition to each designer鈥檚 practice and research and, because of the fashion world鈥檚 insatiable search for the new, it鈥檚 a story that will keep on evolving on the catwalk and on the street.
The Future of Fashion is Now runs at Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen
11 October – 18 January. For further details, visit .
Ruby Beesley
