PARIS, Jun 19, 2008 / FW/ — Has it been 20 years already? Martin Margiela, a darling of the fashion crowd for his high concept designs and also enjoying commercial success with both is menswear and womenswear line, celebrates 20 years of fashion with a unique exhibition at the Antwerp Mode Museum (Fashion Museum) slated from Sep 12,2008 thru Feb 8, 2009.
Conceived in close collaboration with Maison Martin Margiela, the exhibition which is simply entitled ‘MAISON MARTIN MARGIELA, looks deeply into the different themes and concepts that the designer has explored during the 20 years of its various collections, fashion shows, presentations and events worldwide, design of its shops and offices, exceptional house style and communications policy.
Not your traditional retrospective, (after all, Martin Margiela was never the traditionalist), the Paris-based designer also has created exclusively for this exhibition several limited-edition items that will be on sale during the entire exhibition at the Fashion Museum reception desk. A catalogue in English will accompany the exhibition.
In October 1988, after graduating from the fashion department of the Antwerp Academy and working as an assistant for Jean-Paul Gaultier, Martin Margiela and Jenny Meirens established Maison Martin Margiela.
Their first pioneering fashion show followed in October of that same year. Margiela’s was a radically new visual language, with a silhouette – long, with strikingly narrow shoulders – that diametrically opposed the power dressing of the 1980s. He furthermore declines public appearances.
Early in his career, Margiela emphatically decided to let his fashion speak for itself. All interviews are consistently given in the name of the Maison as a whole and no photographs of the designer are distributed – a sharp reaction against the star status that dominated the fashion scene of the 1980s and 1990s.
Maison Martin Margiela is especially known for its deconstructivist approach and its use of secondhand materials or materials with low commercial value. Its entire oeuvre is characterized by an exceptional combination of classic tailoring and conceptual thinking.
Margiela shows the inside of a clothing item, exposes its construction and focuses on that which fashion anxiously tries to conceal. Unraveling the grammar of clothing, Maison Martin Margiela reveals the strategies of the fashion system as it constructs something radically new. The working method produces an analysis of the system that underlies fashion and is followed through in the many varied aspects of the fashion house.
The scenography for the exhibition is by Bob Verhelst, himself once part of Maison Martin Margiela and therefore very familiar with the work of the fashion house. Bob Verhelst has also successfully worked with the Fashion Museum on various exhibitions. For this project, he has taken the codes and the visual vocabulary of Maison Martin Margiela and translated them into a surprising exhibition concept.
MAISON MARTIN MARGIELA EXHIBIT
Dates: Friday, September 12, 2008, through Sunday, February 8, 2009
Time: Tuesdays through Sundays from 10AM to 6PM
Where: MOMU – Fashion Museum Province of Antwerp
Nationalestraat 28, 2000 Antwerp
Tel: +32 (0)3 470 27 70
Fax: +32 (0)3 470 27 71
Website: www.momu.be
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