GAYLETTER

Viktor and Rolf are a power duo that have designed an intricate body of work together that successfully bridges the worlds of haute couture fashion and conceptual art. They met at the Arnhem Academy of Arts and Design and began working together directly after graduation. You’ll crack open this grandesque book to find stunning handiwork and elegant silhouettes combined with concept driven overtones that won’t be lost to the craft.

Their work together defines fashion as art, “contrasting romance and rebellion, exuberance and control, classicism and conceptualism”. In an interview with exhibition curator Thierry-Maxime Loriot, the designers consulted that they themselves don’t consider their work fashion or art exclusively but simply make what comes to mind. Initially V&R’s work was accepted into the sphere of art rather than fashion but with growing fame their company slowly formed into a recognizable fashion house.

Tony Ellwood of the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne put it best in the foreword, “Art plays an intrinsic role in the personal and creative lives of Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren, who together create some of the most provocative haute couture of the twenty-first century. It was the art world that first embraced Viktor & Rolf’s designs early in their career and now, as they celebrate their twenty-fifth anniversary, their work is more than ever at home in the contemporary museum.”

It became clear to me as I sifted through the pages of the archive that the work inside was masterful in taste and execution; the designs bring together costume and couture with the exhibition value of contemporary sculpture. …

In 1982, Andy Warhol, and several other artists, established the New York Academy of Art, a school focused on traditional education in drawing, painting, and sculpture. Warhol provided funding as well as creative input, and now, more than three decades after his death the academy has put together a new exhibit. Andy Warhol: By Hand, Drawings from 1950s-1980s features drawings and sketches from throughout Andy’s life. Over 150 drawings will be on view — many of them never before exhibited in the United States.

Among many artworks, there are male nudes, which were drawn in the 1950s and never meant for publication or exhibition. It was illegal to distribute that kind of content back then, so the sketches were used just for Warhol’s studies — men laying naked on their backs, depictions of penises, butts. Also on view are sketches for a “Boy Book,” a study of the male face and figure, which was never completed. Andy drew his male friends, but gave them long eyelashes and added little hearts to some of the portraits. There’s a subtle femininity to these men that helps them appear boyish. Separate from those sketches are a collection of male portraits. Men with their bodies relaxed, their legs spread, often shirtless.

A founder of the Andy Warhol foundation, co-curator of this exhibition, and longtime friend of Warhol, Vincent Fremont explains, “It is important for people to know the vital role drawing played in Andy Warhol’s life as an artist. By focusing only on Andy’s drawings, this exhibition is a way to highlight without distraction Andy’s innovative process and experimentation which encompassed pen and ink, ballpoint pen, blotted line, graphite, and acrylic paint.” …