Fashion

Paris: Louis Vuitton
Louis Vuitton, Spring/Summer '08

Paris: Louis Vuitton

Fashion

 

American artist Richard Prince, together with Marc Jacobs, collaborated with Louis Vuitton in a spectacular collision of art, commerce and fashion on Sunday night for the last show on the calendar.

Louis Vuitton Click on the image above to see more of the show

A literal interpretation of Prince’s famed Nurse paintings, inspired by the covers of pulp romance novels, opened the show - a mise-en-scène with Naomi, Nadja, Carmen, Eva et al dressed as sexy nurses. The dozen supermodels donned white synthetic transparent coats over their fluorescent hand-painted dresses, and wore black lace face masks and crisp white caps atop their coiffed hair.

Even the carefully choreographed poses they took came from Prince's work, and in their hands and over their shoulders were the commerce part of this Richard Prince tableaux - the new bags that the artist has created with Jacobs for the house.

Like Takashi Murakami before him, Prince has overworked the brand's famed monogram canvas (this time its base was ‘antiqued’, to appear like old Vuitton trunks) with watercolours and ‘jokes’ taken from American magazines (recalling Prince's Jokes series from 1986).

In another group, he embroidered saucy cartoons from old editions of the New Yorker on pony skin laser-cut with the monogram design. The bags have even been given names, like 'R.P Untitled #3 Monogram Bag' - more suitable for merchandise in Chelsea art galleries than shops on the Champs-Élysées.

Prince’s pulp romance novel covers (such as 'The French Riviera after Dark' and 'New York After Dark') covered both the exterior walls and the interior ceiling of the tent in the Cour Carée du Louvre and inspired the eclectic and varied collection.

9 October 2007 | Fashion