Fashion in the Museum: a Talk with Dr. Valerie Steele

Overview

Documentaries such as "First Monday in May" have recently lent attention to the concept of the fashion exhibition. Figures such as Harold Koda and Andrew Bolton have become well-known figures for their curatorial perspective on fashion, past and present.

A little closer to home, we are lucky to have Dr. Valerie Steele, New York-based Director and Chief Curator of The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology (MFIT) in Wellington for a seminar at Te Papa. Having curated more than 20 exhibition in the past ten years, edited Fashion Theory: The Journal of Dress, Body & Culture since she founded it in 1997, and authored numerous books on fashion history, she has been referred to as one of "fashion's brainiest women."

On Saturday, she will be in Wellington, presenting 'Museum Quality: the Rise of the Fashion Exhibition." She will discuss the history of collecting and exhibiting fashion. Beginning with the first (imaginary) fashion museum in the 18th century, and the first great temporary 'museums,' including the Paris World Fair in 1900, she ends with our era. Fashions are exhibited in dedicated fashion museums, as well as in art, history, and design institutions. Don't miss this intimate talk with one of fashion's most exciting and intellectual figures.