Contemporary art in Paris and New York, a Coco Chanel retrospective in London, and the largest-ever Jan Vermeer exhibition – 2023 will be a very interesting year for all art and fashion fans.
“Picasso. On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of his death”
Vienna, Albertina Museum, from March 17 to June 18
This year marks the 50th anniversary of the death of Pablo Picasso, the most popular artist of the 20th century, whose oeuvre includes 5000 works. The Albertina Museum in Vienna will showcase central works from all the important stages of Picasso’s career: from the blue period paintings to the masterpieces World War II masterpieces to later works such as The Naked Woman, as well as graphic prints from the late period that testify to the artist’s struggle with the transience of life. In total, 70 works by Picasso will be exhibited in Vienna.
Karl Lagerfeld: A Line of Beauty”
New York, The Met, May 5 – July 16
The most important fashion exhibition of the year, traditionally held at the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, this year is dedicated to the work of Karl Lagerfeld. It presents 150 exhibits by Alexander Exter from the 1950s to the maestro’s latest collection in 2019. Interestingly, the exhibition provides a glimpse into the inner world of the couturier, as the exhibits will be complemented by Lagerfeld’s sketches, which emphasize his complex creative process and delicate, attentive collaboration with his chief seamstresses. The exhibition will showcase Lagerfeld’s creations for Balmain, Patou, Chloé, Fendi, Chanel and his eponymous brand Karl Lagerfeld, a diverse and prolific body of work that is unparalleled in fashion history.
Vermeer retrospective
Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, from February 10
In 2023, Amsterdam will host the largest exhibition of the Dutch master of painting Jan Vermeer in history. Unlike his contemporary Rembrandt, Vermeer left a small oeuvre of about 35 paintings. Since his paintings are considered the most valuable treasure of every museum collection, Vermeer’s paintings are rarely shown, so the exhibition in the Rijksmuseum is a unique event. There is only one thing worth adding: Vermeer’s most famous work, Girl with a Pearl Earring, which is kept in The Hague, will be shown in Amsterdam.
Gabrielle Chanel. Fashion manifesto
London, Victoria and Albert Museum, from September 16 to February 25, 2024
“Gabrielle Chanel: A Fashion Manifesto is an in-depth study of Chanel’s sixty-year career, curated by the Palais Galliera in Paris. This exhibition is a real must-visit for fans of fashion history, as it covers the time from the opening of Coco Chanel’s first Parisian boutique in 1910 to the presentation of the last Chanel collection in 1971. The exhibition’s storytelling is based on the idea that in her work Chanel was primarily guided by the concept of freedom, not fashion traditions. A striking example of this is the Chanel2.55, the most famous bag of the House to this day. It was the first popular shoulder bag filled with practical details, from the back pocket designed to store cash to the perfect-sized middle compartment for lipstick and an inner lining to hide love letters.
Marina Abramović
London, Royal Academy of Arts, September 23 – December 10
This fall, the Royal Academy of Arts in London is hosting the largest exhibition of Marina Abramović: it covers 50 years of the world’s most famous performance artist and will also include video performances by Abramović in various locations of the Academy. The exhibition will showcase the artist’s most famous works, including the performance Rhythm 0 (1974), when one of the audience members put a gun to her head, Balkan Baroque, for which she received the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale in 1997, The Artist is Present (2010), when she allowed the MoMA audience to sit opposite her for hours, looking at the artist, and others.
Marcel Duchamp and the allure of the copy
Peggy Guggenheim Museum, Venice, from October 14
A brilliant experimenter, art theorist, and master of challenging the viewer, Marcel Duchamp has gone down in history as one of the brightest and most daring artists of the first half of the twentieth century. Throughout his work, Duchamp questioned the traditional hierarchy between original and copy, worked in the ready-made genre, and was not afraid to replicate his art, thus initiating a discussion about what constitutes a work of art. The centerpiece of the Venice exhibition will be The Box in the Suitcase (1935-1941), a portable museum featuring 69 miniature copies and reproductions of Duchamp’s works that Peggy Guggenheim acquired from the artist in 1941.
This selection was prepared by Jeff Vertes (Gambling Expert and Art Connoisseur).