The legacy of Karl Lagerfeld will be the protagonist of the next MET gala

Karl Lagerfeld he was a regular visitor to the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, from the Seventh on Sale benefit gala in 1991 to the opening of the show Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty in 2011 and, of course, with the exhibition of Chanel made in 2005.

And yet, according to the curator responsible for the Costume Institute, Andrew Bolton, the “Kaiser of fashion”, “never tires of saying that fashion has no place in a museum. “When we worked together on the Chanel show, he was incredibly generous with what he lent us, but he was completely indifferent to the show itself. He said: “Fashion is not art; fashion must be in the street, in the body of women, in that of men’”, revealed.

From 1954 (when he shared the Woolmark Prize with another emerging designer named Yves Saint Laurent) until his death in 2019, the designer Karl Lagerfeld was behind the reins of Balmain, Patou, Chloé, Fendi, Chanel and its own brand of the same name, without stopping for a moment.

For this reason, despite what he himself has Lagerfeld thought about the role of fashion in museums, now it will be the theme of the Costume Institute exhibition, next spring 2023, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. And it was Bolton who was given the task of shaping the ambitious exhibition on one of the most fertile and curious minds in fashion of the 20th and 21st centuries.

According to an article published in the magazine vogue, Amanda Harlech, who worked for a long time with Karl Lagerfeld, will also serve as a creative advisor for the show. “The only thing that was clear to me was that we couldn’t do a traditional retrospective. On the one hand, I think Karl would have hated it. Although one of his facets is that of a historian, and he dabbles in history to deal with the themes of his work, he always looks to the future in his own work; I hated looking at the past. It was something I had a very contentious relationship with,” Bolton said.

Instead, he had to find a unifying key it could serve as a code to decipher our understanding of the enormous scope of Lagerfeld’s output. And he found the beginning of it during Lagerfeld’s funeral at the Grand Palais in 2019: “Among the speakers were some of the first of workshop with whom he had worked for years. He had a first at Karl Lagerfeld who had also been with him at Chloé, and firsts at Chanel and Fendi, and those were the people he worked with the most to translate his design into clothing. And they spoke of him with great affection.

This led the curator to find something in common between all: the sketches de Lagerfeld: “I drew everything. He always said he knew how to draw before he could speak or walk. In many ways, it was their primary means of communication, whether it was faxes or iPhones.

The exhibition therefore focuses on evolution of Karl Lagerfeld’s two-dimensional drawings and how they were transformed into three-dimensional clothing. “I always thought his drawings were very spontaneous and almost impressionistic. But in reality they were extremely precise, almost mathematical. We couldn’t see it because we’re not trained, but his assistants knew to the millimeter what each line meant. Was almost a secret codea language shared between him and these prime ministers, which only they could decipher correctly,” he added.

Around 150 looks (of all the houses he has worked in, as well as his own line) can be seen at the MET with their respective original sketches. Moreover, the interviews In video with their respective previews, filmed by the greats Loic Prigent, will allow visitors to decipher Lagerfeld’s secret code. The interior of the exhibition was designed by ethe architect Tadao Ando. According Bolton, Ando designed a house for Lagerfeld, which was never realized: some of its elements will now come to life.

For its part, Max Hollein, The French director on behalf of Marina Kellen at the MET, said in a statement: “Karl Lagerfeld was one of the most captivating, prolific and recognizable forces in fashion and culture, known as much for his extraordinary creations and tireless creative output as for his legendary personality. This immersive exhibition will unveil his unique artistic practice, inviting the public to experience an essential part of Lagerfeld’s boundless imagination and passion for innovation.”

Based at the Metropolitan Museum of Arts on Fifth Avenue in New York, inside the Tisch Gallery, the show Karl Lagerfeld: a beauty line, we can see see May 5 to July 16. Shortly after the MET Gala 2023, will take place on May 1.

Lagerfeld died in February 2019, after 36 years at the helm of Chanel. In his latest show, he showcased some of the women who inspired him the most, including Penelope Cruz. It is therefore not surprising that the Spanish actress was chosen as one of the hosts of the event.

The name of one of the most acclaimed creative directors in fashion history continues to make the most talked about headlines in the industry. Just a few months ago, his homonymous firm presented in the French capital the collection of Cara Loves Karl in front of a cast of VIP guests among which one could find faces from his closest circle of friends and other great style references.

This isn’t the first time a MET gala has featured a designer. In 1996 and 1997 Christian Dior there Gianni Versace They were respectively the stars of the gala. In the same vein, in 2012, the theme was centered on the wild aesthetics of Alexander MacQueen and a year later he dress code against Schiaparelli and Prada under the title of Impossible Conversations. Some of them have been presented in the form of commemorative or retrospective exhibitions.