What's on the Fashion Calendar for December 2012?

It's been a while since I've dared to post a calendar as it seemed to be one of the most popular posts to be copied onto other sites.....

Here are my picks for December 2012 fashion events:

Valentino: Master of Couture
Photo courtesy of Somerset House, 

Valentino: Master of Couture at Somerset House, London

Opened on 29 November 2012  and runs until 3 March 2013
Somerset House,  Embankment Galleries, South Wing

This exhibition celebrates the life and work of Valentino and features over 130 exquisite haute couture designs worn by icons such as Jackie Kennedy Onassis, Grace Kelly, Sophia Loren and Gwyneth Paltrow in an exciting installation created specially for Somerset House in London, UK.  I adore Valentino, but am wondering whether this exhibition can match the incredible installation at the Ara Pacis in Rome (July 6 - October 28, 2007).



Appearances Can Be Deceiving at Frida Kahlo Museum, Mexico City
Opened on November 22, 2012 and runs until November 2013

Judith Clark curated this exhibition of 300 items of clothing worn by the artist Frida Kahlo. Apparently after her death in 1954 and Diego's death in 1957, art collector Dolores Olmedo who acted as the manager the estate, refused to give access to Kahlo's archives of letters, clothes, jewelry and photographs. They were not unlocked until 2004 after Olmedo died. One of the highlights of the show is a corset designed by Jean Paul Gaultier who considered Kahlo a fashion icon and a source of inspiration.

If you cannot make it to Mexico City, the Art Gallery of Ontario has one of Frida Kahlo's painted corsets on display in their exhibition Frida & Diego: Passion, Politics and Painting. Read my post about the exhibition here.


Impressionism and Fashion at the Musee d'Orsay, Paris
Opened on 25 September 2012  and runs until 20 January 2013

In an essay called "The Painter of Modern Life", Charles Baudelaire encouraged artists to paint contemporary fashion as a way to convey modernity in their work. He wrote: "the gesture and the bearing of the woman of today give to her dress a life and a special character which are not those of the woman of the past.” Baudelaire was friends with many of the Impressionists including Degas, Manet, and Renoir, and their paintings captured women at a time when the rapid changes in fashion revealed subtle clues about class, status and identity. (By the way, this is a topic that I've researched at length and does not necessarily reflect what might be in the exhibition).

In Impressionism and Fashion, the exhibition presents paintings by such artists as Renoir and Manet as well as actual garments and considers how Impressionists such as Renoir and Manet depicted fashions of the day. A team of curators worked on this exhibition including Gloria Groom, curator at the Art Institute, Chicago, Philippe Thiébaut, general curator at the Musée d'Orsay, Paris. and Susan Stein, curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. The exhibition will move to the Metropolitan Museum of Art from February 19 to May 27 and at the Art Institute of Chicago from June 26 to September 22.

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Some of My Favourite Places in Paris

I could go on for days about all the things I love about Paris.  Besides being the capital of fashion, it is home to some of the world's greatest art. I think it would take the entire summer to get my fill of all the museums, but I only had four days. Here are some of the places I visited on my most recent trip to Paris.

Monumenta 2011 by Anish Kapoor at the Grand Palais

To read more about the Monumenta exhibition at the Grand Palais, visit the loop gallery blog for my review here.

Musee Bourdelle

Musee Bourdelle was the home and studio of sculptor Antoine Bourdelle (1861-1929).  Towards the end of his life, Bourdelle initiated plans to turn his studio into a museum and today it houses more than 500 sculpture works including Delacroix, Ingres and Rodin among others. This summer, Musee Bourdelle is the host to the Madame Gres retrospective. Read my review of the Madame Gres exhibition for Fashion Projects here.

Musee de la Mode

Palais Garnier Interior 

The Palais Garnier is the thirteenth home of the Paris Opera since it was founded by Louis XIV in 1669. Designed by Charles Garnier on the orders of Napolean III during the Paris reconstruction project carried out by Baron Haussman, the interior is characteristic of Baroque sumptuousness. While in Paris, I visited Palais Garnier to see a performance of the Bolshoi Ballet.

Musee d'Orsay

Home to the masters of Impressionism, the Musee d'Orsay needs no introduction. In spite of long lineups and a bad case of jet lag, I could not miss visiting this museum.

To paraphrase Gertrude Stein, Canada is my country, but Paris is my hometown.

All photos by Ingrid Mida and are subject to copyright.

Postcards from Paris - Musee d'Orsay

Fin d'arabesque, 1876-1877 Edgar Degas

Musee d'Orsay
St-Germain des Pres
01 40 49 49 78

The Musee d'Orsay is home to the arts of 1848 to 1914 and includes many works that originally came from the Louvre. Opened in 1986, 47 years after it closed as a mainline railroad station, the Musee d'Orsay has an outstanding collection of Impressionist art, including many of my favourite Impressionist paintings by Degas, Manet, Monet, Morisot and Fantin-Latour.