Alexander McQueen's Exhibit in NYC

Ann and I were fortunate enough to have time to see the Alexander McQueen exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art recently. We splurged and bought the exhibit book, which is pretty amazing.I can't really put into words what the exhibit was like, except to say it made me want to write. The creators of the exhibit did an amazing job in making the experience multi-dimensional. By which I mean that the textures and exhibit spaces in each section were perfectly chosen---opulently rich when needed and more minimal when that fit the mood of the clothes better. The music, from classical to material by Mekon, added even more, and the choice of head adornment and shoes, along with a kind of cabinet of curiosities of accessories...well, let's just say it was one of those feasts for the senses that leaves you drained and somewhat emotional, in the best possible way.For the first time, I had the sense of fashion as actual narrative, along with the idea of micro-fictions hiding in the details of the clothes. I was most impressed by the black feather dress, which kept becoming more complex and more interesting the longer I stared at it: it contained multitudes. The dress meshing thatch and an approximation of surf was so tactile to look at that it brought back memories of beach combing in Fiji. The lines of certain clothing fascinated me---especially a skirt of wood that recalled the lines of one of Bosch's creations.The associations the clothes called up---the painterly influence, for example---kept adding new layers and levels to what I saw, and those links brought a whole rush of images associated with grotesques, the romantics, and the decadents. Which brought me back to lines from various weird fictions. Quite a heady experience. Almost hallucinogenic at times. Can you get drunk on fashion? I didn't know you could. But I began, as mentioned, to get the urge to write, and the way in which the fashion created a different perspective on artists and writers with which I was already familiar means that somewhere in my subconscious McQueen's clothes are creating a synergy that will influence my fiction in future.Although video and photos from the book can't begin to replicate the experience of seeing the dresses and other clothes in person, here are some images. I was particularly impressed by the way McQueen could create clothes that were over the top but still somehow didn't seem "costume-y". (Many thanks to Ann, without whom I wouldn't have gone---I had no idea who McQueen was before she dragged me to the exhibit.)The cover is holographic, and protrays a skull that morphs......into his face (rather clumsily shown here---difficult to photograph).The end papers are appropriately extravagant, evoking moth wings, animal print, and wood grain.