In Switzerland | Passageways: on Fashion’s Runway

If you happen to be in Switzerland, you might be glad to know that New York-based Melbourne fashion curator Matthew Linde has produced a runway event and exhibition with outfits and videos from some of the best designers and makers of this world.

The sartorial contributions come from Bernadette Corporation, BLESS , Chantal Kirby, Helmut Lang, House of Beauty and Culture, Hussein Chalayan, Imitation of Christ, Keupr/van Bentm, Maison Martin Margiela, Mike Kelley, Paul Poiret, Thierry Mugler, TELFAR , Viktor&Rolf, W.&L.T. by Walter Van Beirendonck, writtenafterwards and others.

Passageways officially opens on Friday 12 October at Basement Kunsthalle Bern. The fashion show is often where the body, commerce and modernity converge. Designed as  theatre without narrative, fashion’s runway will illuminate the paradox of irrational mutability and mechanical standardisation.

The “first ever” runway introduced the practice of couturiers sending living mannequins (models, human coat hangers) into a public boulevard (or runway) sporting new designs, eliciting shock and photographic dissemination.

While production values of the runway show continue to improve and evolve way beyond little Paris couture salons of the 1800s, the DNA and reason for being hasn’t changed in the slightest. The decadent fashion show, quite often running at a loss (expense/extravagance vs sales profits) is an ultimate exercise in brand positioning, stimulating global sales of lower priced fragrances and accessories, more than the most divine couture seen on catwalks that most people simply cannot afford.

Leaping from Paul Poiret’s epic 1911 “A Thousand and Second Night”, the designers exhibited at Kunsthalle Bern have approached the runway-as-medium, using it twofold to extend and challenge the ideas within their own practice as well as the fashion system at large. 

‘Passageways curates videos of runway shows by designers who have reimagined the catwalk as an exploratory performative tool to produce fashion. Also exhibited are outfits by some of those fashion designers, alongside a series of commissioned replicas that rewrite new histories of the runway as a suspension of fashion-time.

Click here to find out more.

Program

Public Guided Tours
Saturday 13 September, 2 pm with Matthew Linde (in English)
Sunday 21 October, 11am
Sunday 2 December, 2pm

10 Birthday Lunches for Kunsthalle Bern
To celebrate 100 years, Kunsthalle Bern guest chefs will cook for you!
Tuesday 23 October with Anisha Imhasly (Board member Kunsthalle Bern)
Tuesday 27 November with Patrizia Crivelli (Head Engagements in Culture and Society, Burgergemeinde Bern) and Annette Weber (Chef)

Tours take place from 12.30-1 pm with lunch to follow. Please register until the day before.

Archive Stories
with Lucie Kolb (artist and lecturer, Zurich)
Saturday 29 September, 10 am–1 pm

Guided Tour with Coffee and Cake

With Christina Thurner (dance researcher, University Bern). Wednesday 18 October, 2 pm. A collaboration with the third-age University Bern.

Car-Free Sunday
Free admission
Guided tour
Art secret special (for children from 6–11 years)
Sunday 21 October, 10 am–6 pm

Archive Talk #6
Wednesday 24 October, 6.30 pm
With Agathe Jarczyk (Professor of Conservation and Restoration of modern materials and media, Bern University of the Arts), Ralph Michel (Student of Conservation and Restoration of modern materials and media, Bern University of the Arts) and Nicolas Brulhart (Archive Kunsthalle Bern).

Art Secret – Adventurous Expeditions for Children (6 to 11 years)
With Maja Brönnimann (dance professional, Bern)
Wednesday, 31 October, 2–4 pm
Please register by 29 October

Étude 14
Series of events organized by students of Visual Arts and Art History in collaboration with Kunsthalle Bern
With Maria Beglerbegovic, Sofie Lena Hänni, Nina Selina Liechti and Mara Schenk
RSVP here.
Tuesday, 13 November, 7 pm

Schöne Kunst?
Tour through current exhibitions with Jörg Scheller (Philosopher and Art Critic)
A cooperation with Alpines Museum and Kunstmuseum Bern
Tuesday, 20 November, 7.30 pm

Étude Special
Series of events organized by students of Visual Arts and Art History in collaboration with Kunsthalle Bern
With Maria Beglerbegovic, Sofie Lena Hänni, Nina Selina Liechti and Mara Schenk
RSVP here.
Wednesday, 5 December 2018, 7 pm

Parallel exhibition INDEPENCE open now until 2 DECEMBER 2018 at Basement Kunsthalle Bern in Switzerland. Matthew Linde is an independent fashion curator based between Melbourne and New York.

Seen at top and in story: W.&L.T. by Walter Van Beirendonck Spring/Summer 1998 A Fetish For Beauty.