I’ve always been intrigued by the world of fashion and although I recognize I’m by no means an expert I always try to keep myself up to date. Now, it was inevitable to stumble upon the most talked about fashion event of the year: the Met Gala.
The Met Gala is a charity event that funds the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NY inviting top names across various fields, celebrities and (not without polemics) influencers. All the guests (attempt to) dress according to a theme that changes every year thanks to the help of renowned stylists and fashion brands .
from https://www.vogue.it/galleries/gait29996
For this article I thought that it would have been nice to offer an overview of the history of the gala (and I’ll do so), however, I must also state some of the concerns and criticisms that this event raises.
The most evident one is that it has become a short-sighted celebration of privilege and wealth. Such a display has been often compared to the Capitol in the Hunger Games, a comparison that fits the dissonance provoked by seeing famous people being richly embellished and act so oblivious to the hardships of common people and the horrors of conflict around the globe.
Those are valid points although some can argue that one of the reasons to follow the Met is its escapist quality, the ability to create a bubble outside reality and make people “live the dream”.
Personally, I follow it because I hold the belief that fashion is ultimately a form of art contributing to the creation of beauty and culture: it locates us in space and time, it is part of our identity as individuals or members of wider communities and even the most skeptic must recognize its communicative power.
Despite the narrative that sees it as something shallow and unnecessary we all recognize that clothes, fabrics and patterns hold a meaning and even when subtle, sometimes they can be more powerful than words.
With this belief I’ll approach this year’s Met Gala and I’ll ask myself if,despite everything, this can prove to be more than a celebration of the individual.
The story of the gala began in 1937 with the birth of the Museum of Costume Art, fruit of an idea of theatre producer Irene Lewisohn and stage designer Aline Bernstein who started a collection of costumes that might be used on stage and serve as reference for costume and fashion designers. This independent entity was later merged with the Metropolitan Museum of Art (known as the Met), also thanks to president of the department store chain “Lord and Taylor” Dorothy Shave, and became known as the Costume Institute which, unlike other departments, was self-funded. How was it possible to cover expenses then?
The solution was offered by a legendary fashion publicist: Eleanor Lambert, founder of NY Fashion Week. In 1948, she was responsible for the launch of a fundraising gala that she dubbed as “The Party of the Year”. When asked about the event, Lambert declared: “For a long time it has been said that the fashion industry should have one big get-together each year… the committee hopes that this party will become an annual event as important as the Beaux Arts ball used to be”.
The gala was initially conceived as a midnight supper with only 50 guests hosted in December in various locations like the hotel Waldorf Astoria or the Rockefeller Center for the ticket price of 50$. Little changed in the following decades.
This phase of stagnation halted when Diana Vreeland, Vogue’s editor in chief, took charge in 1972 as a consultant for the Met. With her imagination she revolutionized the Gala, moving it inside the museum (whose species were expertly decorated), adding 600 guests and introducing co-chairs. However, one of the most notable additions was the choice of a theme – inspired by the exhibitions curated at the Costume Institute- for each Gala, an element that manages to garner attention to this day.
Vreeland’s successor in 1988 was Pat Buckley, a socialite who, according to many journalists, didn’t have the same touch as her predecessor. Then arrived the woman who guides the Gala to this day – the iconic Anna Wintour, who co-chaired since 1995. As her biographer Amy Odell wrote, the party became a celebration of Wintour’s dominance of the industry.
With her, the Met Gala was moved to the first Monday of May and she increased the party’s size inviting a carefully curated list of celebrities, athletes, and artists from various fields.
Eleanor Lambert, Bettmann// Getty Images
Diana Vreeland, Getty Images
Anna Wintour, Getty Images/ Fairchild archive
Finally, to be more prepared, let’s remember this year’s dress code: “Tailored for you” which, according to Vogue, is “purposefully designed to provide guidance and invite creative interpretation.” It’s a nod to this year’s exhibition and theme “Superfine: Tailoring Black style”. The exhibition’s aim is to “examine the historical and cultural emergence of the Black Dandy, tracing the figure from 18th-century depictions to modern-day representations” and it will feature “historical garments and accessories as well as contemporary garments by designers working in both the United States and Europe. The exhibition, which will be the first since 2003 to be focused on menswear, will also present drawings and prints, decorative arts, ephemera, paintings, photographs, and film excerpts by individuals whose work has been instrumental to the formation and understanding of Black identities and experiences”. It is inspired by the work of Monica L. Miller who, in 2009, wrote the book “Slaves to Fashion: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Identity”.
Miller, who is a Guest Curator of the exhibition, declared: “Fashion and dress have been used in a contest of power and aesthetics for Black people from the time of enslavement to the present, and dandyism has long served as a vehicle through which one can manipulate the relationship between clothing, identity, and power. The history of Black dandyism illustrates how Black people have transformed from being enslaved and stylized as luxury items, acquired like any other signifier of wealth and status, to autonomous, self-fashioning individuals who are global trendsetters. This exhibition will explore concepts that define Black dandyism specifically and uncover elements of productive tension that appear when considering the figure—such as ownership, authority and self-possession, ease, exaggeration, freedom, transgression, dissonance, and spectacularity. It will also highlight the aesthetic playfulness that the dandy engenders and the ways in which sartorial experimentation gestures at both assimilation and distinction—all while telling a story about self and society.”
from the MET’s website: https://www.metmuseum.org/exhibitions/superfine-tailoring-black-style