For Fashion’s Sake displays the interface between fashion and art and consists of works by thirteen young Nordic fashion designers. The exhibition
is produced by EMMA – Espoo Museum of Modern Art and curated by chief curator Reetta Kalajo.
Forest, water, weather, darkness and light are recurrent themes and sources of inspiration in the language of Nordic fashion. The exhibition’s designers are all connected by their strong relationship with the wild and archaic nature. The roots of the designers run deep with their simple and forceful visual language telling tales of nomads, mythical tribes or forces of nature.
From the exhibition’s point of view what is interesting in fashion is its line of demarcation with art: Many of the designers are stimulated by art and often, just like in art, the initial sketches for garments look for inspiration from a new kind of thinking, a breaking through or modes of visual narrative. Indeed this exhibition presents designers whose production contains radical features that expand the boundaries of fashion towards art. However, this exhibition is not an art exhibition, but rather an exhibition of pioneering design where display, presentation and interaction play a significant role.
Presenting the most current fashion provokes thoughts about the relationship of fashion and the ethical and ecologic questions of design. Designers who view the world as visionaries use ecological and ethical sustainability as the moral foundation of their work. The garment tells a story or takes a stance.