Silent Light Fashion In Motion Religious iconography ALEXANDER MCQUEEN AND TORD BOONTJE, 2003 ALEXANDER MCQUEEN AND SHAUN LEANE, 2001 MEDIEVAL & RENAISSANCE GALLERIES, GRAND ENTRANCE, LEVEL 1 IRONWORK, LEVEL 3, ROOM 113 LEVEL 0, ROOM 10, CASE 3 In 2003 the V&A commissioned The 2001 Fashion in Motion live McQueen admired fifteenth-century McQueen and lighting and furniture catwalk event celebrated the Flemish and Dutch art. In explaining McQUEEN’S designer Tord Boontje to design a longstanding collaboration between his fascination with its artists; he said Christmas tree for the Grand Entrance. McQueen and jewellery designer ‘because of the colours, because of the The six metre high tree, named Shaun Leane. Models stalked around sympathetic way they approached life ‘Silent Light’, was made from 150,000 the museum wearing Leane’s […] I think they were very modern V&A Swarovski crystals on polished stainless steel branches. It rotated slowly on contemporary jewelled body armour. for their times’. The Medieval and Alexander McQueen was one of the most visionary a mirrored plinth over a shattered The ironwork gallery proved a striking Renaissance Galleries contain many mirror, reflecting light around the backdrop to the pieces which are now examples of religious iconography, designers of his generation. He used to visit the V&A’s fashion Grand Entrance. considered landmarks in the art of including Robert Campin’s painting and textiles archives and took inspiration from the museum’s couture jewellery and contemporary Virgin and Child. McQueen used diverse collections, which he incorporated into his designs. body sculpture. imagery from Campin’s painting The Thief to the Left of Christ on a jacket He once said “The collections at the V&A never fail to in the collection It’s a Jungle Out There intrigue and inspire me. The nation is privileged to have (Autumn/Winter 1997). access to such a resource.” > 1 2 3 How to use this guide The guide has been designed to take you around points of connection between the V&A and Alexander McQueen. Each area may take about ten minutes to find and explore. The guide should be used in conjunction with the V&A map. Search the V&A’s collections online: collections.vam.ac.uk Keep in touch ‘Silent Light’ by Alexander McQueen Facebook: victoriaandalbertmuseum and Tord Boontje © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Twitter: @V_and_A Instagram: vamuseum All objects featured in this guide are on display at time of going to press Fashion in Motion: Alexander McQueen Virgin and Child, oil painting, Robert Campin, Designed for the V&A by Bureau for Visual Affairs. and Shaun Leane, October 2001. 15th century. Museum No. 769:1-1865. Original design by Charlie Smith Design © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Fashion In Motion Photography The Textile and McQueen’s research National pride Memento Mori ALEXANDER MCQUEEN, 1999 PHOTOGRAPHY, LEVEL 3, ROOM 100 Fashion archive library BRITISH GALLERIES: 1500 – 1760, BRITISH GALLERIES: 1500-1760, THE CAST COURTS, LEVEL 1, ROOM 46A AND B LUNCHROOM, LEVEL 3, 110 STORE NATIONAL ART LIBRARY, LEVEL 3 LEVEL 2, ROOM 57A LEVEL 2, ROOM 58 The first time McQueen took part McQueen said on several occasions The V&A holds the national collection McQueen’s research library was full McQueen’s collections were fashioned Memento mori are images and symbols in the V&A’s Fashion In Motion live that if he had not become a designer, of Textiles and Fashion, which spans a of books on fashion, tailoring, art, the around elaborate narratives that were which are intended to both memorialise catwalk series was in 1999. Here he would have liked to become a period of more than 5000 years, from animal kingdom, photography and profoundly autobiographical, often the deceased and remind one of death. models walked around the museum, photojournalist. His favourite Pre-dynastic Egypt to the present day. gothic literature. He especially loved reflecting upon his ancestral history, The skull motif is one example, which photographers were Joel-Peter in particular the Cast Courts, wearing This collection is now housed at the reading the National Geographic specifically his Scottish heritage. Indeed, has become heavily associated with Witkin, August Sander and Don garments from McQueen’s Arts and Clothworkers’ Centre, but until 2012, magazine. McQueen was known to when he was once asked what his the McQueen brand. The V&A’s McCullin, whose photographs he Crafts Movement-inspired collection printed on garments and used as a large portion of the V&A’s have more than 300 references in one Scottish roots meant to him, he collections contain many examples No. 13, (Spring/Summer 1999). inspiration for transgressive collections of hats, shoes, shawls and collection, and his research boards are responded, “Everything.” McQueen’s of memento mori such as a gold ring installations in his fashion shows. Victorian garments were archived in a testament to his passion for research national pride is most evident in The with a death’s head, which reminds McQueen was fascinated by the Cast He was also intrigued by the the wooden cupboards in 110 store and storytelling. Explore the books and Widows of Culloden (Autumn/Winter the wearer of their own mortality. Courts and once said ‘It’s the sort of pioneering work of the nineteenth- (now the V&A lunchroom). It was here magazines that informed McQueen’s 2006) which was based on the final battle place I’d like to be shut in overnight.’ century photographer Eadweard McQueen would look at the collections development as a designer in the NAL, of the Jacobite Risings in 1746. McQueen once said; ‘It is important Muybridge who had photographed and in particular study the including volumes by John James to look at death because it is a part of humans and animals in motion. construction of frock coats, crinolines Audubon, Juan de Alcega, Charles Explore this gallery where you will find life. It is a sad thing, melancholy but and corsets. Darwin, Ernst Haeckel, Nick Knight, portrait miniatures of Elizabeth I and romantic at the same time. It is the end Peter Beard, and the magazines Dazed embroideries made by Mary Queen of of a cycle – everything has to end. The & Confused and Visionaire. Scots. The British collections enable the cycle of life is positive because it gives V&A to explain not just the history of room for new things.’ design in the British Isles but also the broader sweep of their cultural history. 4 5 6 7 8 9 Fashion in Motion: Alexander McQueen, 1999. Photograph, Eadweard Muybridge, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. 19th century. Museum no. PH.1287-1889. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Ring, unknown maker, 1550 – 1600. Museum no. 13-1888. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Portrait of Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots, Francois Clouet, 17th century. Museum no. 625-1882. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. The Fashion Gallery Grinling Gibbons Gothic Victorian London William Morris The William Morris FASHION, LEVEL 1, ROOM 40 BRITISH GALLERIES: 1760-1900, BRITISH GALLERIES: 1760-1900, GOTHIC REVIVAL, BRITISH GALLERIES: 1760-1900, TECHNOLOGICAL BRITISH GALLERIES: 1760-1900, Room LEVEL 4, ROOM 118A, CASE 6 LEVEL 4, ROOM 122D INNOVATION, LEVEL 4, ROOM 122C ROOM 122 AND 125 LEVEL 1, CAFÉ McQueen’s training on Savile Row, and McQueen was fascinated by the work A defining feature of McQueen’s London was the epicentre of McQueen had a profound respect for McQueen’s favourite gallery in the his attendance of Central Saint Martins of seventeenth-century woodcarver collections was their historicism. McQueen’s world. The son of a William Morris and the Arts and Crafts Museum was the William Morris made him a confident tailor and an Grinling Gibbons, and it is likely that While his historical references were taxi-driver, he grew up in the city’s Movement, identifying with its idealism room, and he spent hours sketching alchemist with textiles. He frequently he saw this cravat during one of his far reaching, he was frequently inspired East End and left school at 15 to and the way it placed value on the here. Morris was commissioned by referenced and reinterpreted historic many visits to the Museum. Gibbons by the nineteenth century, particularly become a tailor’s apprentice on Savile joy of craftsmanship and the natural the museum’s first director Henry silhouettes in his collections, including was a Dutchman working in England, the Victorian Gothic. Row in Mayfair. In 1990 he joined beauty of materials. He spray-painted Cole to design one of the V&A’s three eighteenth-century frock coats, and his London workshop produced the prestigious MA Fashion course at William Morris-inspired floral prints dining rooms. This room’s design nineteenth-century crinolines, and spectacular set piece carvings for McQueen admired the work of Central Saint Martins. onto dresses in the collection Highland demonstrates Morris’s interest in myth Dior’s ‘New Look’ from 1947. palaces and churches. In 1998, William Morris, and the cabinet in Rape (Autumn/Winter 1995), and legend. The deep colours of the McQueen commissioned Bob Watts this gallery is an example of the design McQueen was fascinated by London’s and incorporated Morris-inspired scheme show that he was still under Explore the gallery which houses of Dorset Orthopaedic and master reformer’s work. The Gothic style history, its world-class museums and embroidery on dresses in the the influence of the Gothic Revival the Museum’s fashion collection, carver Paul Ferguson to create a pair of which dominated architecture and emerging ‘Brit art’ scene. His research collection No.