Explore craftsmanship’s role in fashion at Homo Faber, 14-30 September

Fashion pays homage to craftsmanship at Homo Faber

If craftsmanship were a muse for the fashion industry, what would it inspire?

• Clothing and accessories made using traditional artisanal techniques including pleating, knitting, weaving, embossing and carving.
• Pieces that highlight the transformative power of the hand in contemporary fashion.
• Handcrafted mannequins reflecting the same natural materials and artisanal approach as the fashion they display.
• An exhibition that showcases not only the craftsmanship within fashion but within exhibition-making itself.

Some of Europe’s most talented fashion designers, stylists and artisans will be part of a celebration of craftsmanship in the fashion industry in the exhibit Fashion Inside and Out as part of Homo Faber in Venice this September.

Using craftsmanship itself as her muse, renowned exhibition-maker Judith Clark will demonstrate the importance of craftsmanship in contemporary fashion, revealing not only the artisanal skills required to create wonderful clothing and accessories but the craftsmanship involved in exhibition-making itself.

While the fashion industry often focuses on the cult of the star designer, with makers remaining in the shadows, this exhibit will instead celebrate the essential collaboration between designers and artisans, revealing the transformative power of the hand on raw materials.

The exhibit will be staged in the Fondazione Giorgio Cini’s 1960s Gandini swimming pool and garden, a place that evokes summer and nature. Taking inspiration from the setting, Clark has selected contemporary haute couture and avant-garde items made from natural materials that have been visibly transformed by craftsmanship: an embossed leather skirt by Dai Rees, Dolce & Gabbana hessian smocks stamped with ‘fatto a mano’, a Capucci dress adorned with pebbles, the visible seams of Martin Margiela Artisanal, or the wooden beads for a Chanel gown. All these pieces will be displayed in such a way as to pay homage not only to the artisanal skills that created them but to the craftsmanship involved in showcasing them in an exhibition. Specially commissioned mannequins made by Italian firm Bonaveri will reveal the skill of mannequin-making, while the exhibition installations will use the same materials as the fashion on display to showcase the versatility of a single material. Wooden decking on the floor will mirror the wood strips used in a dress; straw will be present not only in hats and dresses but in the wigs and hairpieces that stylist Angelo Seminara will craft for the mannequins.

Fashion Inside and Out is a personal response to the space and to craftsmanship by Judith Clark who aims, through this exhibit, to inspire young fashion designers to new and fruitful collaborations with artisans.

“I hope people will feel how important the conversation between designer and artisan is. The ambition of the designer can be so much expanded through the hand of the craftsman. It is not nostalgic, it is generative.” – Judith Clark

Fashion Inside and Out is one of 16 exhibits that make up Homo Faber: Crafting a more human future, a major new exhibition celebrating European craftsmanship, organised by the Michelangelo Foundation.