On Oct. 22 SCAD FASH Museum of Fashion + Film opened the exhibition Fashioning Art from Paper which will be on view until Jan. 12, 2020.
This exhibition highlights Belgian artist Isabelle de Borchgrave and how she explores 500 years worth of fashion and costume all through paper. Her talent in manipulating paper with paint and embellishments creates a wide reproduction of historic garments that are turned into masterpieces.
The museum is divided into five series of the artist’s work: Splendor of the Medici, The World of Mariano Fortuny, Papiers à la mode, Kaftans and Les Ballets Russes. Each section is heavily adorned with its pertaining theme.
The Splendor of the Medici’s exhibition area resembles a stage by its dim lights and blue lines of detail that remind of theater curtains. Here, Borchgrave catches the era’s love for luxurious fabrics by reproducing them in an ornamented way.
The exhibition also showcases Elizabethan costumes such as look number 15, from Papiers a la mode series, which was Elizabeth I’s court dress. To create this costume out of paper, Borchgrave was inspired by one of Elizabeth’s portraits which perfectly summed up what Elizabethan fashion was all about. It contains the neck ruff, corset and wheel farthingale all made out of different weights of paper manipulated to recreate the fashions at the time.
A standout from this section was look number 9 where the artist depicts Flora, the goddess of spring, which appears on Boticelli’s painting “Primavera.” Borchgrave shows the passion she had for Italian Renaissance artist’s artworks that live Italy’s museums.
The exhibition also highlights Borchgrave’s creation of some major fashion history moments such as Mariano Fortuny’s and his pleats technique. Fortuny began creating costumes for theater later on invented a way of pleating fabric that doesn’t give out. For the creation of the shawl and other garment components, Borchgrave performed the same methods Fortuny had used.
The museum exhibition celebrates Isabelle de Borchgrave’s interest in iconic fashion history moments and she interprets them through paper. To find out more information about this exhibition, visit SCAD FASH Museum of Fashion + Film.
