{"id":417,"date":"2017-11-18T02:34:40","date_gmt":"2017-11-18T02:34:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/?p=417"},"modified":"2017-11-18T02:35:03","modified_gmt":"2017-11-18T02:35:03","slug":"artists-rocked-halloween-costume-designs-like-boss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/2017\/11\/18\/artists-rocked-halloween-costume-designs-like-boss\/","title":{"rendered":"Artists that rocked Halloween costume designs like a boss"},"content":{"rendered":"

At least since the times of Leonardo Da Vinci, artists have tried their hands at designing costumes. The Renaissance master likely intended for his to be used for masquerades or other court festivities. But a number of artists throughout history have developed fruitful relationships with dance companies and choreographers, putting their creative vision in motion. From Leonor Fini\u2019s surreal and scandalous going-out attire to Robert Rauschenberg\u2019s delicate, pointillist leotards, here are seven artists who made their work wearable. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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Robert Rauschenberg<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Merce Cunningham Company Photographed performing, the back drop painting by Robert Rauschenberg.<\/p><\/div>\n

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Rauschenberg and choreographer Merce Cunningham developed a long-lasting partnership, working together on 24 dances in total. One of these titled Summerspace (1958), featured rainbow-hued pointillist backdrops and leotards\u2014a far cry from the American artist\u2019s typical Neo-Dadaist works. Another significant collaboration performed in 1964,Antic Meet, featured a four-armed sweater worn by Cunningham himself, which required the dancer to switch armholes throughout the performance. \u201cOver time with Rauschenberg, there\u2019re certain motifs that recur,\u201d Walker Art Centercurator Darsie Alexander explained to Art news.\u201cYou can see some of his imagery migrate from painting and sculpture into Cunningham\u2019s realm.\u201d \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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Jeff Koons<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Jeff Koons, inflatable Pig Costume Polyvinyl figure with battery driven inflation motor.<\/p><\/div>\n

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Choreographer and \u201cpunk ballerina\u201d Karole Armitage fused the worlds of art, dance, fashion, and music in 1988 with a performance titled Go Go Ballerina on New York’s Lower East Side. Jimi Hendrix and Public Enemy were featured on the soundtrack neo-expressionist\u00a0painter\u00a0David Salledressed the dancers, and Koons crafted the set pieces. A year later, Koons himself tackled a costume for another Armitage production, this one titled Contempt. The resulting blow-up pig suit, the dancer\u2019s legs poking through its porky belly, offers a prime example of the artist\u2019s long-standing interest in inflatable. <\/span><\/p>\n

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Marc Chagall<\/strong><\/p>\n

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The Fire bird: Blue and Yellow Monster<\/p><\/div>\n

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Chagall\u2019s later costumes, for Stravinsky’s ballet. The Firebirdi and Mozart\u2019s opera The Magic Flute, incorporate delicate embroidery and decadent fabrics. But these early designs, for a 1942 performance by the American Ballet Theater, have more in common with his canvases. Each outfit is hand-painted, incorporating themes from Russian folklore alongside traditional Mexican styles. It\u2019s a combination particularly suited to the subject matter: The ballet, Aleko, is based on a poem by Russian writer Alexander Pushkin and premiered in Mexico City.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Isamu Noguchi<\/strong><\/p>\n

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The Hamburg Ballet Costumes<\/p><\/div>\n

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Noguchi, with his polished, pared-down sculptural forms, was well-suited to creating set designs for modern dance. He worked frequently with a host of influential American choreographers, including Martha Graham, Merce Cunningham, and George Balanchine. Balanchine in particular, as one of the founders of the New York City Ballet, commissioned Noguchi to create the sets and costumes for the dance company\u2019s inaugural 1948 performance of Orpheus. \u201cThere is joy in seeing sculpture come to life on the stage in its own world of timeless time,\u201d Noguchi once remarked of his theater collaborations. <\/span><\/p>\n

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Sonia Delaunay<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Drooled over the costumes and sets from the Ballet of Russia<\/p><\/div>\n

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Russian art critic Serge Diaghilev founded the Ballets Russes in 1909, weaving together the talents of major contemporary artists (including Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse) and composers (such as Igor Stravinsky and Erik Satie) for his innovative productions. In 1917, Diaghilev asked Delaunay\u2014an abstract painter whose works feature whorls of colourful, geometric forms\u2014to make the costumes for his revival of Cl\u00e9op\u00e2tre. The exposure helped to launch her design career, which resulted in a series of popular textiles and costumes for opera, film, and ballet. <\/span><\/p>\n

Oskar Schlemmer<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Tradic Ballet 3-figures<\/p><\/div>\n

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The original Triadic Ballet, which premiered in 1922, was an avant-garde production that fused the spheres of dance, music, theatre, art, and architecture into a mesmerizing whole. Formally trained as a painter and sculptor, Schlemmer embodied the multidisciplinary spirit of the Bauhaus crafting costumes and choreography he. Although that occasionally led to mishaps\u2014the first costumes he made fell apart during an early performance\u2014the work was met with wide acclaim during its 10-year run. Specifics of the choreography and score have been lost to time, although photographs and sketches of the costumes still exist; this 1970 arrangement for video attempted to recreate the original production with sculptural costumes and mechanical choreography. <\/span><\/p>\n

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Leonor Fini<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Self Portrait<\/p><\/div>\n

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Fantastical, otherworldly women populate the vibrantly hued paintings of Argentine\u00a0Surrealist\u00a0Fini. And the costumes she donned in real life often transformed her into a similarly fantastical character. (\u201cI have always loved, and lived my own theatre,\u201d she once said.) She was known to dye her hair\u2014in shades of blue, red, orange, or gold\u2014and would arrive at events wearing nothing but a cape of white feathers paired with matching white boots. Following World War II, Fini attended a grand total of 16 costume balls over seven years; her spectacular outfits ended up in magazines each time. As her reputation spread, she began receiving costume and set design commissions for ballets, plays, operas\u2014even films, including Federico Fellini\u2019s’81\/2(1963) and Renato Castellani’s\u00a0Romeo and Juliet\u00a0(1954). <\/span><\/p>\n

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At least since the times of Leonardo Da Vinci, artists have tried their hands at designing costumes. The Renaissance master likely intended for his to be used for masquerades or other court festivities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":419,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[106],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[417,6,896,907,898,895,900,904,909,897,894,901,910,899,911,902,903,724,905,908],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=417"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":425,"href":"https:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417\/revisions\/425"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=417"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=417"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=417"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theasifkamal.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=417"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}