BIG at the Patricia Harris Gallery of Textiles and Costume – Royal Ontario Museum

A new exhibit has opened at Patricia Harris Gallery of Textiles and Costume in the Royal Ontario Museum. BIGshowcases a selection of major pieces from the permanent collection. I was invited to a intimate preview (with Patricia Harris in attendance, eeeee) and managed to get a couple photos.

BIG at the Patricia Harris Gallery of Textiles and Costume – Royal Ontario Museum

A stunning display, BIG is exclusively drawn from the ROM’s collection of nearly 50,000 textiles and costumes. Showcasing 40 artifacts from around the world, this unique exhibition includes objects assuming their BIG status in a myriad of ways. With some objects publicly displayed for the first time, the installation offers a fresh, new way of exploring the ROM’s renowned collections. BIG continues until Fall 2013.

“This installation highlights objects that are BIG,” states Dr. Alexandra Palmer, Nora E. Vaughan Fashion Costume Curator in the ROM’s World Cultures department. She continues, “BIG is not just about size. Even the smallest textile can have BIG personal, social, and cultural value that shifts according to context. BIG brilliantly looks at the meaning of textiles and fashions from around the globe and across time. Excitingly, a number of very recent acquisitions by BIG names are showcased in the display, including two from Toronto donors. Ms. Marlene Mock’s fascinating oversized black dress is part of a larger donation of significant fashions by Maison Martin Margiela, while Ms. Lonti Ebers’ stunning black lace dress by Alexander McQueen, a design she wore to the June 2007 Gala Opening of the ROM’s Michael Lee-Chin Crystal, is also displayed. We are most grateful to both women for their generosity.”

BIG at the Patricia Harris Gallery of Textiles and Costume – Royal Ontario Museum

A recent acquisition, and now a highlight of the Museum’s permanent collection and this exhibition, Passage #5 was designed by John Galliano for Christian Dior Couture. Specially commissioned by the ROM and made possible by the generous support of the Louise Hawley Stone Charitable Trust, this dramatic coat-dress was inspired by fashion illustrator René Gruau’s drawings of the 1940s and 1950s and is a 21st century reworking of Dior’s 1947 New Look. Passage #5 was a highlight of Dior’s Spring 2011 collection. A short documentary, produced by Dior, and generously funded by The Dorothy Strelsin Foundation, the ROM’s Textiles Endowment Fund, and the Louise Hawley Stone Charitable Trust, complements the display. The film details the intricacies involved in creating this remarkable garment, including the 500+ hours by a Dior team. The ROM is the sole international museum to commission such a unique document of the construction of an haute couture design.

Other exhibition highlights representing the breadth of the ROM’s international collections include a Pre-Columbian Peruvian feather cape dated to 1000 -1476; an Indonesian bark cloth wrapper; and spectacular textiles created for Exposition Internationale des arts décoratifs et industriels modernes – the BIG Art Deco exhibition held in Paris, 1925. Textiles from Albania, Canada, China, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Denmark, France, Germany, Ghana, Hungary, India, Italy, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, United Kingdom, and USA, vibrantly demonstrate the exhibition’s BIG global scope. In addition to Galliano for Dior, contemporary fashions by leading designers Martin Margiela, Alexander McQueen, Vivienne Tam, and Tom Ford for Yves St Laurent are among the other BIG names on display.

BIG at the Patricia Harris Gallery of Textiles and Costume – Royal Ontario Museum