Skin + Bones:
MOCA’s Mixed Media

If you’ve watched the SciFi Channel lately, then you’ve probably noticed one of their commercials about a dress that sprouts quills when a man gets too close to the woman wearing it. Guess what—it really does exist! See the real thing at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) where J. Meejin Yoon’s Defensible Dress contains a motion detector that makes the dress’s quills rise when someone gets too close.

The current show is about the intersection of architecture and clothing. It has ten main sections, and four of them are thematic: clothing/buildings reflecting “Identity,” “Shelter,” “Geometry,” and “Creative Process.” How the items in each section fit the theme is up to the viewer to decide. I personally felt the section called “Creative Process” worked well when it featured the methods of architect Frank Gehry along with fashion designer Narciso Rodriguez.

You might also want to check out the Russian Doll collection—a model is dressed from spare sackcloth undergarments to multiple layers of dresses and coats. In this exhibit, separate mannequins showcase each layer, and a video of the process runs on a loop to show each layer as it is applied to the model.

I also liked how practicality, purpose, and aesthetics were built into many of the garments, and this is where I think architecture and fashion can meet. Isabel Toledo’s Packing Dress may well be an example of the future in which clothing and luggage are one in the same.

But I’m still not quite convinced about the intersection of architecture and fashion at this show. Yes, some garments, such as Yedhee Tang’s Infanta 2-Circle dress could easily go from garment to tent. But then there was Diller Scofidio + Renfro’s shirts folded like napkins through a process of “mis-ironing.” This looked more like origami than architecture.

However, in the future, I predict that land will become so expensive that most of us will not be able to afford a place to live, and so we can utilize some of the architectural designs of clothing in this show to create all-purpose garments that go from dress to dwelling—all in three easy steps!

I highly recommend this show to fashion lovers and those interested in architecture.