Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Fashioning Fashion: European Dress in Detail, 1700-1915


Quite a while ago, I went to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art to see this show. I took a shitload of photos and stitched them together in iDVD and then added music (Schubert: String Quintet In C, D 956 - 1. Allegro Ma Non Troppo; Wolfgang Böttcher: Melos Quartet). I put it on YouTube and so far it has attracted 4,300 hits—that’s pretty “viral” for this old guy.

Fashioning Fashion: European Dress in Detail, 1700-1915 celebrates the Los Angeles County Museum of Art’s groundbreaking acquisition of a major collection of European men's, women's, and children's garments and accessories. The exhibition tells the story of fashion's aesthetic and technical development from the Age of Enlightenment to World War I. It examines sweeping changes in fashionable dress spanning a period of over two hundred years, and evolutions in luxurious textiles, exacting tailoring techniques, and lush trimmings. Highlights include an eighteenth-century man's vest intricately embroidered with powerful symbolic messages relevant to the French Revolution; an evening mantle with silk embroidery, glass beads, and ostrich feathers designed by French couturier Émile Pingat (active 1860-96); and spectacular three-piece suits and gowns worn at the royal courts of Europe. This exhibition is absolutely stunning and the setting of its touring crates is perfect.

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