BERNHARD WILLHELM: HET TOTAAL RAPPEL
13/7/2007 – 27/1/2008
Designer Bernhard Willhelm (1972, Ulm, Germany) graduated in fashion design from the Antwerp Academy in 1998. Since 1999, in collaboration with Jutta Kraus, he has presented his women's collections in Paris, adding a men’s line in 2004. In 2006, Willhelm and Kraus donated their entire apparel collection to the Fashion Museum. This donation is the incentive for the exceptional retrospective exhibition, BERNHARD WILLHELM: HET TOTAAL RAPPEL, which will be held at the Antwerp Fashion Museum from 13 July, 2007, through 28 January, 2008.
The surrealistic poster illustration portraying a giant hand is a reference to the Bernhard Willhelm label -- a small black hand -- which can be found in all of his designs. The hand also refers to the legend that links the origin of the name of the city of Antwerp to ‘hand werpen’ (throw a hand).
A German journalist once called him the postmodern successor to the Brothers Grimm. Willhelm’s work is characterized by storytelling. He is using absurd visual imagery that is rich in fantasy, in which what at first glance seems innocent and even childlike is repeatedly, subtly undermined. His fashion, however, is never anti-fashion. Along the margins of the great fashion houses, he is consistently constructing his own universe, always with a slightly ironic slant, violating taboos and disrupting accepted dress codes. In inimitable fashion, he unites the banal, the grotesque and the ordinary with the world of high fashion.
For the BERNHARD WILLHELM: HET TOTAAL RAPPEL exhibition, Bernhard Willhelm and Jutta Kraus have invited Swiss artists Taiyo Onorato and Nico Krebs to create the graphic design and scenography for the exhibition. Onorato and Krebs have previously worked with Willhelm and Kraus on the design of look books, showrooms and defilés. The result is a total environment. Each collection is presented in a different decor, so that visitors can become familiar with the most diverse sources of inspiration and thoroughly immerse themselves in the rich fantasy of Bernhard Willhelm’s universe -- a roller coaster ride of images and impressions that is not to be missed!
Bernhard & Jutta’s ‘What we love’ list:
- Birds flying towards us and then flying away again
- The moments between moments, when you're happy
- Cafés with two guests and a dog
- Streets made of golden sunlight
- Meat and dumplings at home
- The high of sex
- A lot of money when we earn it, not later when we spend it
- Art at the moment it's created
- Something too expensive that we can afford
- A certain smile
- Elephant showers
- Death, as long as we're not dying
PRACTICAL INFORMATION
Bernhard Willhelm: Het Totaal Rappel can be seen from Friday, July 13, 2007, through Sunday, January 27, 2008, at the Fashion Museum Province of Antwerp, Nationalestraat 28, 2000 Antwerp, open Tuesdays through Sundays from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tickets are sold until 5:30 p.m.
Admission is free.
FASHION MUSEUM PROVINCE OF ANTWERP – MOMU
Nationalestraat 28
2000 Antwerp
T +32 (0)3 470 27 70
F +32 (0)3 470 27 71
E
[email protected]
www.momu.be
love them 