Balloon fashion February 26, 2009

Margiela balloon jacket -- photo WWD

Ever since I wrote about — and showed a picture of — Jeff Koons’s balloon dog sculpture at the Metropolitan Museum of Art last summer, I have been surprised by the steady number of hits that this blog gets from people looking for “balloon sculpture,” “balloon exhibit,” and similar keywords.

So just for fun, here is a balloon jacket.

It was designed by the eccentric Belgian fashion designer Martin Margiela and was shown last July as part of his Artisanal collection, along with other “garments” handmade from such unusual recycled materials as vinyl records and skeins of yarn. Thirty inflated balloons were twisted to shape the “jacket” shown above.

Pay a visit to his anarchic website to see the Artisanal collection and also his commercial clothing and accessory designs.

Exhibition alerts for NY’s flightiest: featherwork, superheroes, balloon sculpture August 22, 2008

Koons's balloon dog sculpture

“Radiance from the Rain Forest: Featherwork in Ancient Peru” is a special exhibition (open only through Sept. 1) at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC. I haven’t seen the exhibition yet, but the other exhibitions of Andean featherwork that I have seen, and the spectacular images on the Met’s website, suggest that it will be wonderful. According to the Met’s website, “This is the first exhibition at an American art museum to focus exclusively on the subject.” http://www.metmuseum.org/special/radiance_rainforest/featherwork_more.asp. Here is an example of Peruvian featherwork.

Shirt detail

Another apparel exhibition that will be of interest to some of us (perhaps not the same demographic), “Superheroes: Fashion and Fantasy,” will also be at The Met until Sept. 1. Both Giorgio Armani and Condé Nast (?!) were involved in organizing the exhibition, which includes movie costumes, haute couture, and high-performance sportwear. http://www.metmuseum.org/special/se_event.asp?OccurrenceId={5B98D8A0-AB67-4137-8F5E-873FDB82EE73}

If you have any energy left, or are insanely obsessive about rounding off your metaphors, you might want to visit Jeff Koons’s (metal) balloon sculpture in the roof garden. www.metmuseum.org/special/se_event.asp?OccurrenceId={5F785871-78A9-41C4-AEDA-773CA0F10F03}