A lot can happen over dinner. If it wasn’t for a small Japanese restaurant in Paris, the forthcoming Viktor & Rolf survey exhibition at the National Gallery of Victoria [NGV] might never have come to fruition. “It’s even not a famous or trendy place,” says Thierry-Maxime Loriot. And yet it was here that the French-Canadian curator and former model bumped into Dutch fashion mavericks Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren, also frequent patrons of the establishment. “Obviously their work was already well known, and admiration for it was longstanding, with mutual friends like Rufus [Wainwright], so an introduction felt natural. Really, it’s quite an unglamorous story.” Nonetheless, it marks the beginning of what the NGV has billed as a world-first exhibition which, when it opens in October, will showcase Viktor & Rolf’s notion of wearable art. As Mr Loriot says, “Viktor & Rolf are pretty much in another category when it comes to fashion, sitting perhaps with Hussein Chalayan and Iris van Herpen. What they show is not always commercial, but it has the power to set trends. The garments are sculptures, complicated in their construction and with intention behind every design.”
Masters of couture, Dutch duo Viktor & Rolf have often been described as artists by virtue of their complex and technically ambitious couture designs as well as the performative nature of their seasonal fashion shows. Past seasonal collection presentations have featured an entire upside down collection (which mirrors their iconic upside down store in Milan), a complete black collection in which even the models were painted black — Black Light (spring/summer 1999), Babushka (fall/winter 1999-2000) — and a parade that featured one model (Maggie Rizer) on a turntable wearing one entire collection so that she resembled a Russian doll being dissembled piece by piece. Other productions have featured musician Roisin Murphy singing onstage in a signature architectural cut-out tulle gown, and Tori Amos performing as part of Bedtime Story (fall/winter 2005-06), a collection made up of elaborate gowns that resembled a bed complete with pillow, the model transformed into a literal evocation of the idea. “The presentation is an important part of the development of a concept — everything is considered, the show and the collection, as one,” says Mr Horsting.
In 2003/04, the entire collection *One Woman Show* was built around the actress Tilda Swinton, with models selected who resembled the actress, sending a parade of red-haired doppelgangers down the runway. The collection featured surreal details such as shirts with several collars. In 2007, one of the most conceptual shows was staged in which the parading models wore scaffolding supporting lights, so that each model became a contained show. The 2008 collection, entitled *NO!*, was intended as a statement of disapproval about the nature of fast fashion. Models wore clothes with 3D fabric additions of words such as DREAM, WOW, and NO that appeared in three-dimensional sculptural relief or were embroidered onto the clothes.
“Especially recently, emphasis has been placed on the idea of wearable art,” Mr Horsting tells *Manuscript*, noting that the brand recently ceased its ready-to-wear offering to focus solely on haute couture, supported financially by the successful fragrance *Flowerbomb*. “Ever since couture was first made, the clothes have been considered autonomous pieces, not created with a person or wearability in mind, but using fashion as a way of expressing ideas — a laboratory for creativity. The work is regarded as sculpture, as art.” That idea was particularly evident in the designers’ fall/winter 2015 couture collection, in which cloth was draped on the body in such a way as to depict the models coming out from a painted canvas – a most literal, and provocative, evocation of the notion of fashion as art. “That show was presented just after the end of ready-to-wear, and it served to express what couture means — in contrast to ready-to-wear, it is about wearable art, and that show was a literal representation of the idea of the girls wearing paintings.”
In talking to the designers, it quickly becomes clear that the creative conversation between Mr Horsting and Mr Snoeren is ongoing and incredibly rich, and has now been in play for decades. Having met while studying at the Arnhem Academy of Art and Design, the designers came together to show their first collection in 1993, after winning a talent competition as part of the Festival International de Mode et de Photographie in Hyères, France. In the same year, they moved to Paris, setting up their namesake business. “The dynamic of working closely as a duo has always come very naturally,” says Mr Horsting. “It’s almost conditional. It wasn’t something decided intentionally, but something that just happened.” While the business grew in Europe’s fashion capital – including a popular line for high street chain H&M in 2006 and the 2008 sale of a controlling interest to Renzo Rosso, the entrepreneurial owner of Maison Margiela and Diesel – a return to their native Holland provided a certain level of creative freedom. “Stepping back to reflect on the work became important, and Paris was no longer being used as a tool, so returning to the Netherlands made sense.”
In the 21st century, a designer’s image is inherently linked to the success and perception of a brand, and that’s nowhere more apparent than with Viktor & Rolf. The duo created a persona as much a part of the label as the clothes themselves, drawing comparisons to quirky collaborative performance artists Gilbert and George. They have appeared in specially commissioned photographs for collections and even modeled their first menswear collection themselves, changing looks on the catwalk. “The work functions almost like therapy or a personal form of expression, which makes it very intimate,” says Mr Horsting. “That naturally led to appearances in photo shoots and fashion shows—not from a desire for the spotlight, but as a logical extension of the concept.”
Indicative of their artistic credentials, since 1998 Viktor & Rolf have either been featured in or the subject of numerous exhibitions internationally, including a major survey, *The House of Viktor & Rolf*, at the Barbican Art Gallery in 2008. That exhibition presented a non-traditional approach to fashion presentation through the use of 1/3 life-sized dolls dressed in miniature bespoke versions of their clothing, displayed in a large dollhouse. This conscious manipulation of scale challenged conventional approaches to fashion curation, removing familiar elements like adult mannequins and highlighting the absurdity and artistry of haute couture.
The designers have worked closely with Mr Loriot on the forthcoming Australian exhibition, which the curator describes not as a chronological retrospective, but as an exploration of the depth of artistry in Viktor & Rolf’s practice. “It’s very much a contemporary installation of their archive—whether through recurring colours like black and pink, craftsmanship and technique, or the performance-like quality of their shows,” he explains. Mr Loriot also notes that viewing a Viktor & Rolf garment is often rarer than seeing a Picasso painting, due to the exclusive nature of haute couture. As such, staging an exhibition—especially in Australia—is an act of accessibility and inclusion.
“The great thing about a museum is that it’s much more democratic than a fashion show,” explains Mr Horsting. “So many more people can go and have a look.” The designers and the NGV are counting on this with *Viktor & Rolf: Fashion Artists*, following the success of *The Fashion World of Jean Paul Gaultier*, which attracted over 226,000 visitors. The exhibition aligns with NGV director Tony Ellwood’s preference for blockbuster cultural events. “The goal is to leave visitors feeling inspired,” says Mr Horsting. “If that happens, that’s a success.”