via Flavorpill:
Comme des Garçons by Junya Watanabe, Ensemble, fall/winter 2000–2001, Courtesy Metropolitan Museum of Art
- When: Tue Dec 18 - Sun Apr 13 (schedule)
- Where: Metropolitan Museum of Art (1000 5th Ave, 212.535.7710)
- Price: $20
- Details: Event Info
Fashion is a relative newcomer to the reputable Metropolitan, but now the Upper East Side institution is stepping into the fracas of the fashion blogosphere. The museum is displaying 40 new acquisitions from its Costume Institute in blog.mode: addressing fashion, and — hold onto your chapeau — inviting the public to comment on the pieces through a blog on its website. While the armchair fug-sters do battle for most catty remark, the Met's sincere curators intersperse relevant art-historical commentary about such highlights as a 1983 black Comme des Garçons jersey dress and a 1947 Adrian piece featuring a Salvador Dalí design. While the high-class items are undoubtedly worthy of the Met's collection, it's the public dialogue that merits close scrutiny.
– H.G. Masters
via Artnet news, 12/19/07:
MET GETS INTO BLOG MODE
While the average citizen "might shy away from commenting on the merits of a Juan Gris or a Henry Moore," notes Metropolitan Museum Fashion Institute curator Harold Koda, they have no such compunction when it comes to fashion. Thus, the Met’s first blog -- located at http://blog.metmuseum.org/blogmode/ -- invites the public to comment on the new exhibition in the Costume Institute galleries, a presentation of 65 recent acquisitions dubbed "blog.mode: addressing fashion," Dec. 18, 2007-Apr. 13, 2008. Comments can be registered at the Met's website, or on what is called a "blogbar" of eight computer terminals in the museum galleries. So far, remarks seem to be confined to "fabulous" and the like, though one contributor notes that 99 percent of the costumes in the show are for women, "reinforcing the idea that women are the peacocks and men should be looking on or not seen at all."One of the many interesting items in the exhibition is the "Remote Control" Dress (2000) by Hussein Chalayan (b. 1970), a cast-plastic form with side and rear flaps that open to reveal pink tulle. According to Met curator Andrew Bolton, who co-organized the show, Chalayan is one of several contemporary designers who is beginning to issue his designs in limited editions in order to encourage collectors.
