Exhibits

exhibits

Pink: The History of a Punk, Pretty, Powerful Color September 7, 2018—January 5, 2019

“Art must be an integral part of the struggle,” Charles White says. “It can’t simply mirror what’s taking place. … It must ally itself with the forces of liberation.” Over the course of his four-decade career, White’s commitment to creating powerful images of African Americans—what his gallerist and, later, White himself described as “images of dignity”—was unwavering. Using his virtuoso skills as a draftsman, printmaker, and painter, White developed his style and approach over time to address shifting concerns and new audiences. In each of the cities in which he lived over the course of his career—Chicago, New York, and, finally, Los Angeles—White became a key figure within a vibrant community of creative artists, writers, and activists.

White’s vision of a socially committed practice attracted promising young artists, including many artists of color, and he became one of the 20th century’s most important and dedicated teachers. Acclaimed contemporary artists David Hammons and Kerry James Marshall were among his many students: as Marshall reflected, “Under Charles White’s influence I always knew that I wanted to make work that was about something: history, culture, politics, social issues. … It was just a matter of mastering the skills to actually do it.”

Charles White: A Retrospective is the first major museum survey devoted to the artist in over 30 years. The exhibition charts White’s full career—from the 1930s through his premature death in 1979—with over 100 works, including drawings, paintings, prints, photographs, illustrated books, record covers and archival materials.

Fashion From Nature April 21, 2018—January 27, 2019

Outfit made from leather off-cuts and surplus yarn, Katie Jones, 2017. Photograph by Rachel Mannn

The Victoria and Albert museum’s Fashioned from Nature showcases contemporary designers of “desirable,

creative and sustainable popular fashion” to examine how fashionable dress recurringly draws on the beauty and power of nature for inspiration. Supported by the European Confederation of Flax and Hemp - CELC Fashion, the exhibition features more than 300 garments and accessories from designers including Christian Dior, Dries van Noten, Philip Treacy, Stella McCartney, Christopher Raeburn, Calvin Klein, Gucci, Giles Deacon, and Jean Paul Gaultier.

It explores how fashion’s processes and constant demand for raw materials damage the environment, featuring campaigners and protest groups that have effectively highlighted this issue such as Fashion Revolution and Vivienne Westwood. It also explores the role of design in creating a better, more sustainable fashion industry.

Other highlights include a pineapple fibre clutch-bag, Emma Watson’s Calvin Klein Met Gala 2016 dress made from recycled plastic bottles, an upcycled dress by Christopher Raeburn, a cape of cockerel feathers and an haute couture dress designed by Giles Deacon in 2016 featuring a pattern of delicate bird’s eggs.

A look to the past 400 years of fashion is also highligted by the exhibition to see what fashion has learned from practices in the past, with objects dating to the early 1600s. Items include an 1875 pair of earrings formed from

the heads of two real creeper birds and an 1860s muslin dress decorated with the iridescent green wing cases of hundreds of jewel beetles. They are shown alongside natural history specimens to indicate the ways fashion has used animal materials in its designs and production.

The exhibition also focuses on the raw materials used in the production of fashion. Arranged chronologically, it introduces the main fibres used in the 17th and 18th centuries such as silk, flax, wool, and cotton, as well as now controversial materials like whalebone, demonstrated by an X-ray by Nick Veasey of a pair of 1780s stays, and turtle shell, used in a fan from 1700.

This leads into the expansion in international trade, import of precious materials, and the introduction of man-made materials, which brought fashionable dress to the masses but also contributed to the air and water pollution to which the textile industry is such a significant contributor.

The exhibition also presents a range of solutions to reducing fashion’s impact on the environment from low water denim and using wild rubber to more conceptual and collaborative projects. These include a dress grown from plant roots by the artist Diana Scherer, who uses seed, soil and water to train root systems into textile-like material, a bio-luminescent genetically-engineered silk dress created by Sputniko!, the MIT Lab and the National Institute of Agricultural Science (NIAS), South Korea, and a tunic and trousers made from synthetic spider silk from Bolt Threads x Stella McCartney.

There are also be two interactive installations from the Centre for Sustainable Fashion at London College of Fashion, which have acted as special advisors to the exhibition, that will explore ‘Fashion Now’ and ‘Fashion Future.’

ArtDiction | 13 | September/October 2018