With Rei Kawakubo/Comme des Garçons: Art of the In-Between at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, curator in charge Andrew Bolton and Rei Kawakubo have succeeded in creating an intimate experience that is nothing short of extraordinary.
Elevated from the Costume Institute’s usual underground home to accommodate Kawakubo’s requested layout, the visitor enters an almost clinical atmosphere, with white cylinders rising from the floor and an array of fluorescent bulbs illuminating the space. Wind between the pods and Kawakubo’s work is revealed, a few pieces at a time.
The journey through the show feels like discovery, as if fantastic, otherworldly sculptures have been nestled in the middle of whitewashed Torqued Ellipses for you alone to see. The layout also encourages focus, which these complex works are deserving of. Stand in front of a black lace dress, for example, and tiny, doll-sized dresses will appear in the tiers and folds. Pause anywhere, really, and whether the work is printed, bulbous, fuchsia or depths of black, each piece feels welcoming, calming, and a world away from the chaos of fashion cycles or runway shows.
The exhibition is loosely grouped into themes and sub-themes (examples include Birth/Marriage/Death and Then/Now) but beyond that, the floor contains no explanations and no materials or dates. This is apparently a concession to the artist-designer, who doesn’t typically talk about her work. It is refreshing to wander undirected though there is, for those who want it, a rather thick and academic booklet at the entrance, which goes into the kind of analysis of inspiration and concept that Kawakubo avoids.
After admiring the sampling from Kawakubo’s oeuvre, it’s worth taking another walk through the exhibition to see visitors’ reactions to the famously avant-garde work. After all, Kawakubo once said, “I learned that beautiful things for me are not necessarily beautiful to everyone else, but they could well be something very scary.” On a rainy Friday morning, the newest Comme des Garçons pieces and gingham dresses from Spring 1997 inspired the most photographs. Nearby, two ladies stopped in the middle of the floor to pick something new from their Museum map; one conceded with a casual shrug, “We don’t think like this. But there are other people who do.” Passing a series of knitted pieces from the Fall 2014/2015 “Monster” collection, a man whispered to his companion, “I assume they do ready-to-wear, but what does it look like?”
Meanwhile, few sections away, a mother called repeatedly to her toddler, who was standing alone in a narrow doorway, peering into a small white room. It contained a “2 Dimensions” dress in blue and pink polyester felt. Unable to look away, the child was clearly delighted.
“Rei Kawakubo/Comme des Garçons: Art of the In-Between” runs through September 4 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
