Unexpecting Forms
The Rei Kawakubo art exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art displayed the designers work from her early career in the 80s to today paired with many wigs created and styled by Julien d’Ys.
Rei manipulated the idealized female body in mainstream fashion. Her dysmorphia silhouettes and faceless mannequins are more art pieces then anything wearable. She pokes at the idea that beauty lies in the imperfections influencing culture and how society views the female form.
Rei’s unusual approach to the way clothes relate to the female body is her way to “change the value of beauty in a positive way”. By creating oddly shaped bodies with padding, she questions beauty and the "grotesque". This process is her response to societies commentary on women’s bodies. Her exploration of proportion and the female body is subtly hinted at through her waistless dresses and her hole-less sleveless tops, that entrap the body.
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