Now at NGV: Collecting Comme

Whether you’re a fashion fanatic or not, the newest exhibition Collecting Comme featured at the National Gallery of Victoria will deliver. Dedicated to the work of fashion designer Rei Kawakubo, this striking exhibition showcases an array of beautifully designed garments from the fashion house, Comme des Garçons. With donations from collector Takamasa Takahashi, this exhibition comes to life in Australia’s first display dedicated to Comme des Garçons. 

Japanese fashion house Comme des Garçons is known for its contemporary designs using techniques that are unique to their brand. Many of the styles displayed were the first to feature raw hems, holes and the like. A shock to the fashion world, one method was starting from zero, forgoing the use of patterns to create garments. Since Kawakubo’s first display in 1981, this fashion house has designed in a way that continues to push the envelope with its striking and unconventional clothing. Methods of dissembling, twisting and re-attaching are often used in Comme des Garçons pieces. 

Inspired by punk elements and radical design methods, Comme des Garçons questions the dressing around genders through experimentation of fabrics, definitions of beauty standards, taste, garment shape, and function. Brave and modern, the brand has redefined the relationship with the body and the clothing it carries. ‘I would like for people to look at Kawakubo’s work with an open mind: to question what they are looking at and consider the story behind the creation of the garment,’ says Mr Takahashi.

Collecting Comme features 65 outfits from Rei Kawakubo, taken from more than forty collections. The exhibition also includes 13 works designed by Kawakubo’s protégés Junya Watanabe and Tao Kurihara. Collecting Comme showcases three works from the Body Meets Dress-Dress Meets Body collection (spring–summer 1997). This runway showcased outfits stuffed at the hips, abdomen and shoulders with bulging pillows of polyurethane. This collection was often described as the ‘lumps and bumps’ collection. These garments were created as a refusal to see the physical body as a limitation. Kawakubo is a pioneer in the fashion industry and often focused on how the clothing felt on the body, rather than how it looked. 

Other standout pieces include works from Kawakubo’s early runway collections – Destroy (Holes) (autumn–winter, 1982–83) and Patchworks and X (spring–summer, 1983) – where the garments are purposely distressed and unfinished. The infamous hole-and-dropped-stitch garment including Sweater 1982, which was created by deliberately faulting the knitting machines will also be on display.

A legacy stretching back almost fifty years, Kawakubo’s designs continue amaze and inspire the world of fashion. Collecting Comme explores the unconventional, abstract and radically defying pieces of Kawakubo and two of her proteges. The exhibition layout and style is much the same as the fashions displayed: contemporary, dark, and almost apocalyptic in design. With unfinished looking exhibits and paint splatters, Collecting Comme is modern and raw. 

Kawakubo’s designs are not to be missed – the exhibition is open till Sunday, 26 July 2020.

Collecting Comme
National Gallery of Victoria, 180 St Kilda Road, Melbourne, 3006
Till Sunday, 26 July 2020
ngv.vic.gov.au/exhibition/collecting-comme