The Tamesis
Is fashion art? This centuries-old question is addressed in “The Art of Costume,” the new exhibition that establishes the theme of this year’s Met Gala. Whatever your thoughts on the subject, fashion’s fascination with fine art is well-documented. Perhaps this can be partly explained by the attraction of opposites, the eternal (alslonga) and ephemeral.
Looking back at history, Madame Grès and Madeleine Vionnet used three-dimensional tailoring and bias tailoring respectively to convey the ideal of classical beauty. Elsa Schiaparelli collaborated with the Surrealists to create works reflecting the interwar period. Among Yves Saint Laurent’s many homages to art, which include references to Piet Mondrian, the Ballets Russes, Georges Braque, Vincent van Gogh and Pablo Picasso, is a nod to Sharpe himself. Looking ahead, while Marc Jacobs was working at Louis Vuitton in the 2000s, his high-profile collaborations with Stephen Sprouse, Takashi Murakami and Richard Prince set the template for countless future mash-ups of art and fashion. Some of these have been collected to form a fashion lover’s introduction to art history.
Andy Warhol
