30 January 2024 |
Transforming the Maeght Foundation into his latest stomping ground, Simon Porte Jacquemus sought to explore the space between the artist and the bourgeois.
It was a fitting destination for him to do so. Overlooking Nice, the fantastic hillside home, established in 1964 by its namesake, contains 13,000 pieces of blue-chip 20th century modern art. Joan Miró’s La Caresse d’un Oiseau and Alexander Calder’s Les Renforts call it home. Alberto Giacometti’s lumpy, bumpy, stick-figure statues (Les Femmes de Venise) backdropped the show. But these weren’t Jacquemus’s point of departure, rather, Giacometti’s bulbous Femme Cuillère (Spoon Woman) was.
Led by Gigi Hadid, a troop of swollen-shouldered co-ed looks came out en plein air. They wore snake-embossed buttermilk pencil skirts, slinky spaghetti-strap dresses, some with ‘oeuf’ waists, and hourglass suits exploding with spatterings of fringe. Fine v-neck knits preppily tied-over-the-shoulder were so similar to the grey ones sent out as invitations that attendees wearing theirs might have had the urge to get up and walk through the sculpture garden themselves.
Ella Mccutcheon wore a crisp white collared shirt with slouchy tailored trousers. But these weren’t just your usual run-of-the-mill slacks; these were multi-dimensional, with a circular insertion blooming up and out from the waist.
Without compromising on concept, the show closed with a modern take on bridal wear. It featured a flimsy chiffon veil and strong bodice, sculpted like a secondary body, square at the clavicle and otherwise adhering to the gentle curves of the model’s frame before spilling into a draped skirt that dragged across the floor. Les Sculptures. Tres chouette.
Photography courtesy of Jacquemus.
