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There is even, in the \u201caging body\u201d section, an enormous gray hoodie, emblazoned with the phrase: \u201cI\u2019M RETIRED. (This is as dressed up as I get.)\u201d Just in case you\u2019re tired of the whole glittery glamour thing.<\/p>\n
Bolton took The Associated Press through the exhibit late last week as a huge team of installers was busy hammering, nailing, posing and otherwise adjusting the 400 items on display. Here are some of the highlights.<\/p>\n
A new space, giving fashion its due <\/p>\n
Last year, the Met Gala, a fundraiser for the Costume Institute, brought in a record $31 million. That gargantuan sum alone \u2014 it grows every year \u2014 can explain why the museum has granted its only self-funding department some prominent new digs, fashioned from former retail space on the museum\u2019s main floor, right off the Great Hall. \u201cWe’re in the epicenter of the museum,\u201d notes Bolton, with evident pride. It will house all future fashion exhibits, making them easier to reach for guests and enabling shows to last longer; \u201cCostume Art\u201d will be up for 8 months.<\/p>\n
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The universality of \u2026 diversity<\/p>\n
The show travels through centuries of art history by pairing art objects with fashion garments, making the argument that not only is fashion art \u2014 that’s indeed the gala dress code \u2014 but more profoundly, art is fashion. Its first main gallery bears the title \u201cBodily Being in its Diversity,\u201d and begins with flowing Grecian-style gowns, paired with images on Greek vases or flasks. But the display soon veers from classic forms into those that fashion has traditionally ignored.<\/p>\n
The pregnant body, unhidden<\/p>\n
Bolton argues that the pregnant body has either been ignored or stereotyped in art. Here, he presents designers \u2014 often female, working in the late 20th century or later \u2014 who have explored and accentuated the expectant form. The so-called \u201cpregnancy dress\u201d from British designer Georgina Godley, which appeared in her 1986 \u201cBump and Lump\u201d collection, is a straightforward celebration of the extended pregnant belly. It is paired with a rare (for the time) 1920 sculpture by French artist Edgar Degas, \u201cPregnant Woman\u201d \u2014 a nude figure holding her belly and seeming to reflect on what’s to come.<\/p>\n
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The corpulent body, unfettered<\/p>\n
Garments on display here include the corsetry of designer Michaela Stark, who posed herself for three of the new mannequins. One of them displays the corsetry ensemble \u201cFat Not Fertile\u201d \u2014 fighting the trope that a larger body represents reproduction and fertility. Stark uses corsets to bind the flesh and accentuate, not hide it \u2014 to \u201cbring back power to the female form.\u201d The ensemble is paired with an ancient marble statuette resembling the same body type.<\/p>\n
The disabled body takes center stage<\/p>\n
A striking subset of the Reclaimed Body section explores the disabled body, itself divided into different types of disability: physical, sensory and cognitive.<\/p>\n
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In one ensemble, a mannequin based on Paralympian athlete, model and actor Aimee Mullins wears a pair of Victorian-esque Alexander McQueen boots, which are really prosthetic limbs. The outfit is paired with a 1965 sculpture, \u201cThe Amputee,\u201d by John Gutmann.<\/p>\n
Irish disability activist Sin\u00e9ad Burke, who was born with dwarfism, also posed for two mannequins. One wears a Burberry trench coat, cut down for length \u2014 and including part of a discarded sleeve, refashioned into a headpiece. The other is a Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm McLaren \u201cMickey and Minnie\u201d dress, paired with an ancient Egyptian statue of a dancing dwarf.<\/p>\n
Model and activist Aariana Rose Philip, who uses a wheelchair, also posed for a mannequin, placed in its own chair \u2014 wearing a pair of denim shorts and a shirt bearing the slogan: \u201cQueer Capital.\u201d The display is accompanied by a work from artist Lucy Jones, who, like Philip, lives with cerebral palsy.<\/p>\n
Exploring a less visible disability is a coat by Scottish designer Nadia Pinkney, who paid homage in her \u201cRemember Me Knot\u201d collection to both her grandmother and great-grandmother, who had Alzheimer\u2019s. The coat\u2019s pattern \u2014 derived, according to curators, from brain scans \u2014 is meant to reflect the \u201cphysiological tangles\u201d the disease inflicts on the brain\u2019s structure.<\/p>\n
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It’s paired with a lithograph by Willem de Kooning, whose own experience with Alzheimer\u2019s affected his late-career work.<\/p>\n
The vital body \u2014 colorful and bloody<\/p>\n
The second main gallery is devoted not to diversity so much as commonality \u2014 those things that unite us all. Like aging, which the show seeks to reframe as \u201ca mode of sophistication rather than biological decline.\u201d And mortality. There\u2019s also a whole bloody section on, well, blood.<\/p>\n
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This includes Westwood\u2019s \u201cMartyr to Love\u201d evening jacket where shiny beads represent a muscled torso, and deep red beading portrays blood dripping from a wound. It is paired with German painter Albrecht D\u00fcrer\u2019s \u201cMan of Sorrows with Arms Outstretched.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n \u201cCostume Art\u201d<\/a> opens to the public May 10 and runs through Jan. 10, 2027.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Designs in the “Pregnant Body” section are displayed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute exhibition, “Costume…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":218356,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[86088,86089,80456,86093,86090,86092,86094,80457,75,84,83,86086,80455,86091,9,24,63,833,834,38762,3065,2336,38761,829,2337,2338,80458,86087],"class_list":["post-218355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-manhattan","tag-albrecht-durer","tag-alexander-mcqueen","tag-andrew-bolton","tag-edgar-degas","tag-georgina-godley","tag-john-gutmann","tag-lucy-jones","tag-malcolm-mclaren","tag-manhattan","tag-manhattan-headlines","tag-manhattan-news","tag-met-gala-exhibit-2026-body-types","tag-michaela-stark","tag-nadia-pinkney","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-package-100024-ap-online","tag-package-100373-mc-complete-state-national","tag-package-100923-member-choice-lifestyles-option","tag-product-30083-ap-new-york-city-news-no-weather","tag-product-30085-ap-new-york-state-news-no-weather","tag-product-30594-lifestyles-formerly-weekly-features","tag-product-30598-ap-national-news-report-a-wire","tag-product-31388-premium-entertainment","tag-product-33328-ap-premium-entertainment-other","tag-vivienne-westwood","tag-willem-de-kooning"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218355"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218355\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/218356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}