Lee Alexander McQueen: Mind, Mythos, Muse

Lee Alexander McQueen's iconic fashion is juxtaposed with historic textiles and works of art, revealing his dynamic approach to storytelling. His collections combined his unique training in tailoring, theatrical design, and haute couture with a breadth and depth of encyclopedic and autobiographical references spanning time, geography, mediums, and technology. This book documents his diverse sources of inspiration by displaying his imaginative fashions alongside related artworks from LACMA's permanent collection, providing a new and innovative assessment of his work and highlighting his mindful approach to storytelling and construction through fashion.

Format: Hardback
Length: 176 pages
Publication date: 08 April 2022
Publisher: Distributed Art Publishers

McQueen's iconic fashion was juxtaposed with historic textiles and works of art, revealing the designer's dynamic approach to storytelling.

One of the most significant contributors to fashion between 1990 and 2010, British designer Lee Alexander McQueen was both a conceptual and a technical virtuoso. His critically acclaimed collections synthesized his unique training in Savile Row tailoring, theatrical design, and haute couture with a remarkable breadth and depth of encyclopedic and autobiographical references spanning time, geography, mediums, and technology. McQueen's singular viewpoint produced exquisitely constructed, thought-provoking, often subversive or allegorical fashion.

Taking a reflective look at McQueen's artful design process, this book documents the designer's diverse sources of inspiration by displaying McQueen's imaginative fashions alongside related artworks. McQueen's encyclopedic references range from ancient Greece and Rome to Tibetan silk brocade patterns, 17th-century Dutch painting, the prints of Goya, and the films of Stanley Kubrick. In each of these cases and beyond, examples of McQueen's imaginative and extraordinary work are displayed alongside artworks from LACMA's permanent collection. Spanning art from a multitude of mediums, eras, and cultures, this publication provides a new and innovative assessment of McQueen's work and highlights his mindful approach to storytelling and construction through fashion.

Lee Alexander McQueen (1969–2010) was one of the most important fashion designers at the turn of the 21st century. In 2011, following his death, the Costume Institute in New York organized an enormously successful retrospective of his work at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Dimension: 311 x 222 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781636810188