Visit the Met Fashion Exhibit 2018
art review
'Heavenly Bodies' Brings the Fabric of Faith to the Met
A museum'south blockbuster welcomes the Vatican's holy garments to New York — and genuflects at the altar of haute couture.
Yves Saint Laurent's bronze vestment for the Virgin of El Rocío, circa 1985, with gold silk brocade and pearls, in "Heavenly Bodies: Mode and the Catholic Imagination" at the Met. Credit... Vincent Tullo for The New York Times
Once there was a homo who wore the finest silks in Italian republic, just traded them all for sackcloth. His father was a wealthy cloth merchant, and in his youth he gamboled about Umbria in colorful, dandyish outfits. But when he had his calling he stripped off his fine clothes, pledged his torso to God, and spent the residue of his life in a mendicant's robe. He was Saint Francis of Assisi, and when the archbishop of Buenos Aires was proclaimed pope in 2013, he gave himself a new name, in honor of a homo unembroidered.
I wonder what both Francises, saint and pontiff, might make of "Heavenly Bodies," the Metropolitan Museum of Art'south jumbo, hotly debated and richly anointed exhibition on the interweaving of manner and Roman Catholicism. Years in the making, it includes exceptional loans of vestments from the Vatican — some of which take never earlier left Rome — and more than than 150 ensembles of secular article of clothing from the last century. Hither is papal regalia of unsurpassed intricacy, simply likewise space-age brides, monastic couture, angels in aureate lamé, and a choir up in the balcony dressed in head-to-toe Balenciaga.
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For the 55 designers exhibited hither, Catholicism is both a public spectacle and a private conviction, in which dazzler has the force of truth and faith is experienced and articulated through the body. Sacrilegious? Heavens, no: The show is deeply respectful of the globe'southward largest Christian denomination, fifty-fifty reverential. But it takes communion at Fellini'south church rather than Francis'south — a surreal congregation whose parishioners limited their devotion through enchanted excess.
"Heavenly Bodies" is the largest exhibition ever offered by the Met's Costume Institute and was organized by its curator, Andrew Bolton. Information technology runs from its defended downstairs hall to the Byzantine and medieval galleries and into the Lehman Wing; information technology then continues at the Cloisters, the museum's serene dwelling for religious art in Upper Manhattan. Well-nigh of the designers here were or are Catholics, including historical figures similar Elsa Schiaparelli, Cristóbal Balenciaga, Christian Lacroix and Yves Saint Laurent, and active designers similar Jean Paul Gaultier, John Galliano, Raf Simons and Maria Grazia Chiuri.
Catholic Europe dominates; the United States is represented by Thom Browne (Mr. Bolton's partner) and Kate and Laura Mulleavy of Rodarte; but designers from Latin America, the pope'due south one-time stamping ground, are dismayingly absent-minded.
Subsequently Mr. Bolton's rigorous left-brain exercises of the last two years — the excellent, tech-minded "Mitt × Machina" in 2016 and the torso-questioning retrospective of Rei Kawakubo last year — this evidence is a return, for better and worse, to the high spectacle of "China: Through the Looking Drinking glass." It goes heavy on the Catholic drama, with mannequins posed as angels and novitiates, and there's music throughout. (Playing in the medieval sculpture hall is an intolerable loop of staccato string accompaniment, drawn from a motion-picture show soundtrack by Michael Nyman, that will brand you wish the Costume Constitute would accept a Cistercian vow of silence.) Information technology as well places the clothing amid the Met's superb drove of Byzantine and medieval art — ivories, tapestries, reliquaries. This intermarriage of religious art and secular way feels refreshing in places, silly in some; either way, it's an effect.
"Heavenly Bodies" is, to use a formula Catholics will observe familiar, both one show and iii. You can begin your approach to this trinity of manner with the showcase of holy vestments in the basement galleries, or you tin outset upstairs with the grand secular displays inspired by Catholic bureaucracy and anniversary (the weakest third). And so conclude at the most wistful, and strongest, third — the gowns evoking orders and sacraments at the Cloisters.
upstairs
An Ecclesiastical Pageant
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The exhibition's presentation of secular clothing begins on either side of the Met's cardinal staircase, in the hallways devoted to Byzantine art. Five evening dresses from a recent collection of Dolce & Gabbana feature hand-sewn paillettes that cohere into icons of Mary and the saints, based on the mosaics of a Sicilian church. More than inspired are Gianni Versace'southward diaphanous dresses of gold and silver mesh, a signature material that the designer garlanded with crosses. He presented them for fall 1997: a flavour he never saw, as he was murdered that summer in Miami.
Versace drew inspiration from the Met'south 1997 blockbuster, "The Glory of Byzantium," and these clingy sheaths set the stage for an encounter betwixt religious art and apparel for the (rich and sparse) laity.
In a gallery shaped like a Byzantine alcove stands a Gothic haute couture gown by Jean Paul Gaultier — technically stunning but too gaudy to beloved — that incorporates holographic images of saints and aluminum panels decorated with eyes or hearts, similar the ex-votos believers place in shrines. A mask of leather straps and cruciform plastic beads past the Belgian duo A.F. Vandevorst offers a rare dose of fetishism, though it is not half as fierce as the Met's rosary from 16th-century Germany in the aforementioned case, composed of ivory beads half-face, one-half-skull.
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Up here the show's designers, the architects Diller Scofidio + Renfro, have opted for a consciously operatic display. Spotlights autumn on a low-cut gown of red silk, designed by Pierpaolo Piccioli for Valentino this year, flashing more skin than any cardinal would allow. The hall's Spanish iron choir screen frames an centre-popping haute couture ensemble by John Galliano for Dior in 2000-1, with a beaded headpiece shaped like a bishop's mitre. The back is embroidered with a crucifix and the inscription "Dieu est mon maître": God is my master. (A male model wore this gown in Mr. Galliano's presentation, though it was designed for clients of either gender.)
Yet those who feared that this exhibition might border into irreverence volition exist relieved to hear that it takes few liberties. Quite the contrary: Mr. Bolton, a Catholic, treats the organized religion so earnestly that he re-sacralizes the medieval art on display. His arroyo to the "Catholic imagination" treats the visual splendor of the church as more only a poor man's bible, but as a manifestation of God that inheres in all beauty, including fashion. Holy vestments serve in the transubstantiation of vino and staff of life into blood and body, and in a like way these secular garments besides plow the Met's medieval drove back into objects of worship.
Anyhow, if these designers are sometimes rule breakers, they are non apostates. In fact two gowns here, 1 by Saint Laurent and the other by Riccardo Tisci, are not for humans at all; they were designed as costumes for statues of the Madonna.
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This decision to mimic, rather than analyze, the splendors of the church building is highly uncommon for a museum, and bracing in places. 1 can come across why Cardinal Dolan and other ecclesiastical figures have been pleased. The downside is that "Heavenly Bodies" pushes so difficult on the senses hither that y'all are forced to leave your art historical tools in the nave. How were these ensembles made? Whom did they influence? Those are questions for tomorrow; for at present, let usa pray to saints Cristóbal, Jean Paul and Raf.
Such a carnal approach to Catholicism also comes at the cost of critical engagement with the ironies of fashion — above all, with ironies of gender. It seems, nearly always, that the transference of the "Catholic imagination" from sacred clothing to secular has to laissez passer through a woman's body. There is virtually no men's wearable in this exhibition; one rare entry is a wool coat past Mr. Simons, inspired by a priest'due south soutane. The angels clad in Lanvin and Rodarte inhabiting the final gallery are all women, as well. This display may merit a thousand praying-hands emoji on Instagram this summer, but you might ask whether these designers accept merely perpetuated the gender discordance of the church in a more colorful key.
downstairs
Churchly Elegance
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The diplomatic and liturgical coup of "Heavenly Bodies" is in the Anna Wintour Costume Center, which features virtually 4 dozen articles of clothing and other regalia of recent popes, lent from the Sistine Chapel Sacristy. The church building obliged the Met to go on the religious garments separate from the fashion objects, and they wanted a clean display, every bit the vestments are even so in use. Diller Scofidio + Renfro delivered with a design of extreme restraint. Chasubles, mantles and tiaras appear in pristine cases, and entire walls are left white.
A glorious cope, or outer cloak, painstakingly made between 1845 and 1861 and worn by Pius Nine, is laid apartment similar a grand, clothing semicircular tapestry; in its cardinal gold shield is a dynamic nascency scene in embroidered silks of blue, pink and melon. A vision of Adam and Eve's expulsion sits beneath.
Pius Nine seems to accept been a bit of a apparel hound, and of the many accessories in a smaller gallery — mitres, crosiers, rings, and a pectoral cross of gilded and amethysts that would adjust Cher — the most opulent are Pius's three tiaras, festooned with rubies and sapphires. A High german-made tiara hither is ringed by three crowns comprising nineteen,000 stones, mostly diamonds.
These are awe-inspiring, though you need non be Martin Luther to look askance at their opulence. In the prove's catalog, Fundamental Gianfranco Ravasi writes that while "dazzler and art have been the inseparable sisters of faith and Christian liturgy for centuries," Catholics ought to call up Jesus's warning, in the Woes of the Pharisees, non to make a show of your dress. No pope has worn a tiara since the Vatican Two reforms of the 1960s — unless you count Jude Law as the chain-smoking, archconservative "Young Pope," who sported 1 for his terrifying investiture speech.
the cloisters
Monastic Solitude
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Where the clothing at Fifth Avenue draws on Catholicism'southward rigid hierarchy and public rites, the Cloisters showcases fashion reflecting the quieter side of faith. It's here you'll find, in the reconstructed Spanish chapel, the prove'southward well-nigh famous ensemble: Balenciaga's 1967 wedding gown, made of silk the color of water ice milk and topped with an architectonic hood in place of a veil. Erroneously known equally the "ane-seam hymeneals dress," this boggling garment appears to have been immaculately conceived rather than sewn. Hither, too, the scenography is hardly subtle; the Balenciaga bride faces the apse as if in prayer, and speakers twitter "Ave Maria."
But in general Mr. Bolton'southward choreographed rendezvous between contemporary wear and holy fine art of the past are more rewarding in the Cloisters' tight confines, where i-to-one encounters come more easily. Precisely arced straw hats past the experimental milliner Philip Treacy appear as a mathematician's response to the wimples of "The Flying Nun," and sit down in front of Netherlandish reliquary busts of female person saints. A long black clothes from 1999 past Olivier Theyskens, its bodice incised with a cruciform gap, stands between painted limestone statues of Saints Margaret and Petronilla. Near the garden is an boggling couture clothes past Ms. Chiuri and Mr. Piccioli for Valentino; its metal-thread embroidery translates Cranach's Adam and Eve, and its flora and fauna, into splendiferous ornament.
Mr. Bolton has made the unexpected and rewarding conclusion to place more than a dozen ensembles outdoors, in colonnades that ring the key cloister. Most outfits draw on monastic apparel, including Mr. Piccioli's elegant hooded dress of brown cashmere and Mr. Owens' notorious (and rather stupid) sportswear robes cut out at the crotch. And at that place are older pieces, including an evening wearing apparel made in 1969 by the French designer known every bit Madame Grès, whose beige pleats are cinched by a brown knotted belt. Its inspiration is unmistakable: the habit of Zurbarán'due south painting of St. Francis of Assisi, the rough brownish cloth evoked through Madame Grès's pilling angora wool.
His namesake gave a speech this September that is worth keeping in mind when you run across "Heavenly Bodies," in which he insisted that what is holy resides non in beauty lonely. "I enquire for the Church and for y'all the grace to find the Lord Jesus in the hungry brother, the thirsty, the stranger," Pope Francis pleaded. And to discover information technology, too, in "the one stripped of clothing and dignity."
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A star filter was used for the images of Yves Saint Laurent'south statuary vestment, Christian Lacroix'southward "Gold-Gotha" ensemble, Leo XIII's mitre, Pius IX'due south tiara and a Viktor & Rolf ensemble from 1999-2000.
"Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination," Through October. 8 at the Metropolitan Museum of Fine art and the Cloisters; 212-535-7710, metmuseum.org.
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