Land Ho! The World’s First Landscape Fashion Show

Fashion is often defined as, art that we live our life in. FAM’s most recent exhibit Land Ho! does not feature clothes per se, but the collective feeling of their canvases, drawing and installations creates a sense of intimacy that can only be replicated by the clothes we wear against our skin. As viewers are drawn into the world created by the art, we imagine ourselves a part of the art, wearing patterns of the textiles designed by these landscapes. This image of our own life, clothed in these artworks creates a sort of fashion show in our minds. The fragmented perspective seen in Michele Lauriat’s drawings and canvases creates a mod, pattern that could make for a top selling dress at Niemen Marcus. Her specific cutout style is reminiscent of Christian Dior’s latest runway look, where car wash pleats stole the spotlight. If you had a ticket to attend a single fashion designer’s show and one to attend the Land Ho! exhibit, but they were held on the same night-choose Land Ho! The dark walls, the stark lighting and the innovative prints in FAM’s latest show transport you directly to New York Fashion Week’s 2015 show. Instead of watching the same idea walk past you multiple times, you can walk through several different ideas that still come together in your mind, like a ready-to-wear collection.

When you walk into the room, Warner Friedman’s trompe l’oeil plays with size at an innovative junction that is manifested as an outfit when Celine showed wrist collars that pop out at you. An understated strength of Land Ho! is the ability to make you imagine the outfits of the people, populating these landscapes. Shona Macdonald’s Sky on the Ground #1 has an invisible shadow of a girl peering into that gray puddle, wearing Issey Miyake’s sturdy rain boots to repel the muck; Edward hopper’s two lights Maine, is potentially a view from a nostalgic onlooker in a Miu Miu trench coat, visiting the beach for one last time before winter hits. I have never seen landscapes that are as fresh and full of life as something you could wear to the actual beach, marsh, zen garden… The little black dress, the pantsuit and blue jeans, changed the face of clothing. Land Ho changes the face of art in a way that is truly by incorporating fashion and becoming both chic and timeless.