Fine form

Notions of womanhood are integral to Maria Grazia Chiuri’s vision for Dior.  For the brand’s S/S 2018 show, Chiuri created a hall of mirrors from 80,000 shards of glass, in a nod to the work of French-American artist and sculptor Niki de Saint Phalle. For A/W 2018, a cut-and-paste inspired show set featured 3,000 poster images advocating women’s rights. For A/W 2019, the artistic director teamed up with the octogenarian Italian artist and writer Bianca Pucciarelli Menna, who works under the male pseudonym Tomaso Binga, an alter ego she adopted to highlight the privilege awarded to male artists. Binga’s works include the 1976 ‘Alfabetiere Murale', a typographical alphabet with letters formed from nude portraits of Binga herself. For the show, these letters were tessellated across the interior of the Musée Rodin in a grid of bold black, white and red tones. Dior worked with special events behemoth Bureau Betak on the production and creative direction of the runway design, which bought a new meaning to womanhood and word play.