Savage Beauty (exhibition)

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Exhibits from the "Savage Beauty" exhibition Savage Beauty exhibition.jpg
Exhibits from the "Savage Beauty" exhibition

Savage Beauty was an art exhibition held in 2011 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art featuring clothing created by British fashion designer Alexander McQueen, as well as accessories created for his runway shows. The exhibit was extremely popular in New York City and resulted in what was then record attendance for the museum. [1] The curators were Andrew Bolton and Harold Koda. [2]

Art exhibition organized presentation and display of works of art

An art exhibition is traditionally the space in which art objects meet an audience. The exhibit is universally understood to be for some temporary period unless, as is rarely true, it is stated to be a "permanent exhibition". In American English, they may be called "exhibit", "exposition" or "show". In UK English, they are always called "exhibitions" or "shows", and an individual item in the show is an "exhibit".

Metropolitan Museum of Art Art museum in New York City, New York

The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the United States. With 7.06 million visitors to its three locations in 2016, it was the third most visited art museum in the world, and the fifth most visited museum of any kind. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among seventeen curatorial departments. The main building, on the eastern edge of Central Park along Museum Mile in Manhattan 's Upper East Side is by area one of the world's largest art galleries. A much smaller second location, The Cloisters at Fort Tryon Park in Upper Manhattan, contains an extensive collection of art, architecture, and artifacts from Medieval Europe. On March 18, 2016, the museum opened the Met Breuer museum at Madison Avenue on the Upper East Side; it extends the museum's modern and contemporary art program.

Fashion design art of the application of design and aesthetics to clothing and accessories

Fashion design is the art of applying design, aesthetics and natural beauty to clothing and its accessories. It is influenced by cultural and social attitudes, and has varied over time and place. Fashion designers work in a number of ways in designing clothing and accessories such as bracelets and necklaces. Because of the time required to bring a garment onto the market, designers must at times anticipate changes to consumer tastes.

Contents

The show opened on May 4, a little more than one year after McQueen's death, and closed on August 7.

Contents

The exhibit was organized by the museum's Anna Wintour Costume Center and curated by Andrew Bolton and Harold Koda. The exhibit featured McQueen's pieces from the archives of his own London fashion house, Alexander McQueen, and of the Parisian couture house Givenchy, as well as pieces held in private collections. [3] The show is composed of six separate galleries, arranged by theme: "The Romantic Mind", featuring some of his oldest work in the early 1990s; "Romantic Gothic and the Cabinet of Curiosities", featuring his exploration of Victorian Gothic themes; "Romantic Nationalism", examining Scottish and British identity; "Romantic Exoticism", examining non-western influences in his designs; "Romantic Primitivism", featuring natural materials and organic designs; and "Romantic Naturalism", featuring his attempts to integrate themes of the natural world with technology. [3]

Anna Wintour Costume Center Fashion library and museum collection, part of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in collaboration with the Brooklyn Museum

The Anna Wintour Costume Center is a wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art that houses the collection of the Costume Institute. The center is named after Anna Wintour, editor-in-chief of Vogue, artistic director of Condé Nast, and chair of the museum's annual Met Gala since 1995. It was endowed by Lizzie and Jonathan Tisch. As of August 2017, the curator is Andrew Bolton.

Alexander McQueen is a British luxury fashion house founded by designer Alexander McQueen in 1992. Its current creative director is Sarah Burton.

Givenchy is a French luxury fashion and perfume house. It hosts the brand of haute couture clothing, accessories and Parfums Givenchy, perfumes and cosmetics. The house of Givenchy was founded in 1952 by designer Hubert de Givenchy and is a member of Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture et du Pret-a-Porter. It is owned by luxury conglomerate LVMH. Its current artistic director is Clare Waight Keller, who is the first woman to hold that position.

The exhibit includes pieces from his first major collection, Jack the Ripper Stalks His Victims, created during his graduate studies at Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design. [4] Other notable collections in the exhibit include Dante, #13, VOSS, Irere, and Plato's Atlantis, [5] as well as Banshee, Highland Rape, The Widows of Culloden (including the original life-size hologram of Kate Moss), and Horn of Plenty. [4]

Kate Moss English model and businesswoman

Katherine Ann Moss is an English model and businesswoman. Born in Croydon, Greater London, she was discovered in 1988 at age 14 by Sarah Doukas, founder of Storm Model Management, at JFK Airport in New York City.

Reception

Queues outside the exhibition, August 3, 2011 Queues at Savage Beauty.jpg
Queues outside the exhibition, August 3, 2011

The exhibit was widely praised by critics in the international press. Hilary Alexander of The Daily Telegraph called it "an absorbing, astounding walk through the extraordinary convolutions of his mind, and the technical virtuosity he could summon up in order to turn his ideas and thoughts into reality". [4] Holland Cotter of The New York Times wrote that the show "is a button-pushing marvel: ethereal and gross, graceful and utterly manipulative, and poised on a line where fashion turns into something else", but also noted that the exhibit steers clear of addressing questions about the contradictions in his work. [6] Suzy Menkes of The International Herald Tribune also had some issues with the presentation: "Mr. Bolton might have discussed the designer’s place in the British art scene, alongside the Chapman brothers, or compared his fascination with nature’s decadence with that of Damien Hirst. Instead, we get Sarah Jessica Parker’s breathless and witless take on the McQueen style." Overall, though, she said the exhibit "is exciting, stimulating and thought-provoking – and a raw vision of the wild McQueen imagination." [7] Judith Thurman of The New Yorker advised that "even if you never bother with fashion shows, go to this one. Andrew Bolton ... has assembled a hundred ensembles and seventy accessories ... and he gives their history and psychology an astute reading." [8]

Hilary Alexander Fashion journalist

Hilary Alexander is a New Zealand-born British journalist and former fashion director of the Daily Telegraph. She was twice named Journalist of the Year in the British Fashion Awards. She is editor-at-large for HelloFashion Monthly and freelances as a stylist and broadcaster.

<i>The Daily Telegraph</i> British daily broadsheet newspaper

The Daily Telegraph, commonly referred to simply as The Telegraph, is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally. It was founded by Arthur B. Sleigh in 1855 as Daily Telegraph & Courier.

Holland Cotter is an art critic with the New York Times. In 2009, he won the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.

The show was also extremely popular with the public, leading the museum to take extraordinary measures to meet demand. Originally scheduled to run only until July 31 that year, it was extended through August 7. Patrons waited in lines of up to two hours to see the exhibit. [9] To accommodate the large crowds, the Met offered a special $50 ticket to view the exhibit on Mondays, when the museum is usually closed. [10] [11] Over 17,000 of these tickets were sold. [12] The Met also allowed its members to skip the line; museum membership increased 15%, with 20,000 new memberships sold during the show. [12] During the final weekend of the exhibition, lines stretched to over four hours, [13] and the museum stayed open until midnight for the first time in its history. [9] By the time the exhibit closed, over 650,000 people had seen it, [14] making it one of the most popular exhibits in the museum's history, and its most popular fashion exhibit ever. [15]

Subsequent showings

From March 14, 2015 to August 2, 2015, the exhibition was housed in the Victoria and Albert Museum. [16] [17] [18] The exhibition was extremely popular there as well, selling more than 480,000 tickets and prompting the museum to stay open 24 hours a day during the last weekends of the exhibition to meet demand. [19] This was the first time the museum had ever extended its hours this way to accommodate interest in an exhibition. [20]

Victoria and Albert Museum Art museum in London

The Victoria and Albert Museum in London is the world's largest museum of decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and named after Queen Victoria and Prince Albert.

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References

  1. ↑ Orden, Erica (22 July 2011). "Met Hits 40-Year Attendance Record". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 6 August 2011.
  2. ↑ Trebay, Guy (29 April 2015). "At the Met, Andrew Bolton Is the Storyteller in Chief". New York Times. Retrieved 13 August 2015.
  3. 1 2 "About the Exhibition". Metropolitan Museum of Art. Retrieved 5 August 2011.
  4. 1 2 3 Alexander, Hilary (2 May 2011). "Alexander McQueen's 'Savage Beauty' honoured in style". The Telegraph. Retrieved 6 August 2011.
  5. ↑ "Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty at The Costume Institute of The Metropolitan Museum of Art N.Y.C". AlexanderMcQueen.com. Retrieved 6 August 2011.
  6. ↑ Cotter, Holland (4 May 2011). "Designer as Dramatist, and the Tales He Left Behind". The New York Times. Retrieved 6 August 2011.
  7. ↑ Menkes, Suzy (2 May 2011). "Alexander McQueen in All His Dark Glory". The International Herald Tribune. Retrieved 6 August 2011.
  8. ↑ Thurman, Judith (16 May 2011). "Dressed to Thrill". The New Yorker. Retrieved 6 August 2011.
  9. 1 2 Vogel, Carol (27 July 2011). "Met Museum to Stay Open for McQueen Show Later Than Ever Before". The New York Times. Retrieved 6 August 2011.
  10. ↑ Kennedy, Randy (31 May 2011). "Met Museum to Add Hours, Charge $50 to Accommodate McQueen Show Crowds". The New York Times. Retrieved 6 August 2011.
  11. ↑ Vogel, Carol (11 July 2011). "Met's McQueen Show Adds Yet More Hours". The New York Times. Retrieved 6 August 2011.
  12. 1 2 Swanson, Abbie Fentress (5 August 2011). "Hundreds Line Up to See Alexander McQueen Show Before it Closes". WNYC.com. Retrieved 6 August 2011.
  13. ↑ Hollander, Sophia (6 August 2011). "Not Since the 'Mona Lisa'..." The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 6 August 2011.
  14. ↑ Beja, Marc (7 August 2011). "Thousands show up for last day of Met's McQueen exhibit" . Retrieved 8 August 2011.
  15. ↑ "McQueen show shuts in NY after record attendance". AFP. 6 August 2011. Retrieved 7 August 2011.
  16. ↑ "Ikon London Magazine coverage of Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty Fashion Gala". Ikon London Magazine. 14 March 2015. Retrieved 3 March 2018.
  17. ↑ "Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty - About the Exhibition". V&A . Retrieved 10 March 2015.
  18. ↑ Dowd, Vincent (10 March 2015). "Alexander McQueen: Revolutionary and friend". BBC News . Retrieved 10 March 2015.
  19. ↑ "Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty is most popular show in V&A's history". The Guardian. August 3, 2015. Retrieved October 29, 2015.
  20. ↑ "Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty is most popular show in V&A's history". The Guardian. August 3, 2015. Retrieved October 29, 2015.

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