There are varying definitions of what it means to be part of “Generation Z.” Roughly, it’s the cohort of people born between 1997 and 2012, the group who came of age during the dawn of smartphones and social media, navigating a global pandemic as they came of age. Photo Elysee’s Gen Z – Shaping a New Gaze spotlights 66 artists from around the world who fall into this category. The show is an immersion into the concerns and aspirations the younger generation, from the climate crisis and political upheaval, to shifting gender norms, body image, inherited trauma and displacement. The lineup includes Ziyu Wang, whose Go Get’Em Boy deconstructs the performative masculinity expected of him by his father. Laurence Philomène’s contribution also tackles gender expression, celebrating trans existence through highly saturated, cinematic and vulnerable images. Elsewhere, Emma Sarpaniemi explores definition of femininity through humorous and performative self-portraits. Gen z – Shaping a New Gaze spotlights artists who use the lens to assert their need for representation and their desire to speak out in an unstable global context.  

Each year, Fotografisk Center presents Young Danish Photography, showcasing emerging talents and trends on the art scene. The exhibition, which has occurred since 1998, features eight exciting new practitioners, including Frederik Brogaard, Rasmus Degnbol and Tilde Døssing. This edition brings together figures who are pioneering new methods for documenting the impact of the climate and biodiversity crises and human exploitation of natural resources. It is to be expected that new artists turn their attention to this topic, which has provided an existential threat for most of their lives. In particular, they consider how these often intangible events – such as rising sea levels, air and marine pollution, whaling and global warming – can be made concrete, visible and present through photography and video. Guest curator Dansk Dokumentarisme says: “With this exhibition, we hope to celebrate a more nuanced and intelligent visual language capable of embracing the abstract and diffuse issues confronting us. This is, in our opinion, the overriding challenge facing documentary photography in the years to come.” 

The Museum of Australian Photography holds an extraordinary and ever-evolving record of how we see ourselves and each other. Their archive – the only public collection solely dedicated to photography in Australia – contains some of the nation’s most vital image-makers. Young: Youth in Australian Photography asks visitors to consider the role of the camera in both capturing and influencing the story of growing up. It captures the fleeting and formative, reflects cultural ideals and anxieties and constructs the very image of youth itself. Interestingly, the show goes beyond the experience itself, questioning how our early years are performed, remembered and mythologised. There’s a nostalgic, almost dreamy quality to many of the featured works, like Naomi Hobson’s series Adolescent Wonderland (2019), which sees young protagonist rendered in colour against a black-and-white background, in a distinctly comic-book style. Others are painfully realistic, rendering the awkwardness, vulnerability and raw emotions of adolescence in stark reality. Here, the entire spectrum of youth is laid bare for all to observe.  

Four artists from the photography schools of Barcelona come together in this show, sharing a critical and sensitive look towards the construction of memory. They use distinct visual languages, which include analogue and digital photography and the rereading of personal and public archives, to investigate how photography can become a tool for exploring interpersonal links, revealing how individual experience is shaped by broader cultural, industrial and ideological forces. Together, the four figures producing a fascinating look at contemporary life. In Opaco, Irina Cervelló examines the cultural, environmental and economic implications of the Solvay petrochemical complex in her hometown, Martorell. In Tous les maux mots sont inventés, Abril Coudougnan immerses the viewer in his personal photographic archive, a multitude of images taken over six years. Looking for George, by Patrick Martin, invites a reflection on the myths that shape collective memory. In the final part of the show, Bernat Erra continues that exploration in Fe de errata, analysing the construction of a collective identity found within Catholicism.

Words: Emma Jacob

Image Credits:

1. Atong Atem, from the series Studio series (2015). Courtesy of the artist and MARS Gallery.
2. Gabriela Marciniak, Untitled 005, de la série Early Retirement, 2023 © Gabriela Marciniak, ECAL.
3. Tania Franco Klein. Mirrored Table, Person (Subject #14) from Subject Studies: Chapter 1. 2022. Inkjet print. 29 1/2 × 39 1/2″ (74.9 × 100.3 cm). © 2025 Tania Franco Klein. Courtesy the artist.
4. Simon Terrill, Garden, (2006). Courtesy of the artist and Sutton Gallery.
5. Tilde Døssing, Leyndarmál, 2023.
6. Abril Coudougnan, Untitled, project Tous les maux sont inventés , 2024. Digital photograph. © Abril Coudougnan.

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Featured artists include Cristóbal Ascencio (b. 1988), whose project Las Flores mueren dos veces (2021-2024) is rooted in a deeply personal, and multi-layered, experience of loss. “My father died when I was 15, but I was not told it was a suicide until I turned 30. It was then that I started to revisit the images, places and memories that were left behind.” Ascencio rifled through his family archive and visited the last garden where his father, Margarito, worked. Hangar presents the artist’s interpretations of old pictures and plants, constructed using data manipulation and photogrammetry techniques. The results have a glitch-like aesthetic. Also investigating paternal relationships is Danilo Zocatelli Cesco (b. 1989), whose series Dear Father (2023), now at Hangar, charts the artist’s journey towards connection with his parent through drag.

Family Stories also foregrounds a poignant long-term project from Deanna Dikeman (b. 1957), who, for 27 years, took photographs as she waved goodbye and drove away from her parents at their home in Sioux City, Iowa. Likewise, Francesca Hummler (b. 1997) has documented her younger sister for over thirteen years, with the dual aim of building her sibling’s self-confidence and helping her navigate her identity as a young Black girl in a German-American family. Elsewhere, Daesung Lee (b. 1975) sheds light on “the suppressed lives and quiet strength” of women in traditional Korean society, taking inspiration from his mother. “I hope to breathe life into voices that have long been silenced,” the artist says. Meanwhile, Sanne de Wilde (b. 1987) offers a new conceptual series that probes belonging, borders and systems of control.

Closing out the show are playful collages by Alma Haser (b. 1989). The artist, known for signature photo-collages, was raised in the Black Forest by a German father and an English mother. She grew up bilingual, and has long been fascinated by “the poetic absurdity of literal translations.” Everything has an ending only the sausage has two (2024) is the culmination of this interest, transforming German idioms into their English equivalents through cutting, layering and folding. The results are humorous and surreal, visualising ideas like “We are sitting beautifully in the ink” (to be in trouble) or “To have a tomcat” (to have a hangover).  

Family Stories is an exhibition that, much like Steichen’s mid-20^th century landmark, traverses the full scope of emotion. Viewers will feel kinship, joy and sorrow in equal measure. They may even let out a tear, or stifle a chuckle. It is a celebration of photography that reminds us of how after all these years, we are still using the camera as a means to get to the heart of what it is to be human beings, be that together or apart.

Family Stories is at Hangar, Brussels, from 23 January – 17 May.

hangar.art

Words: Eleanor Sutherland

Image Credits:
1. Not to take a sheet of paper in front of the mouth, 2024 © Alma Haser
2. From the series Las Flores mueren dos veces, 2021-2024 © Cristóbal Ascencio
3. Curly Permed Hair, from the series Nirvana, 2024-Ongoing © Daesung Lee
4. Das Badezimmer, 2021 © Francesca Hummler

The post Photography and Kinship appeared first on Aesthetica Magazine.

A: Take us back to the start. How did this exhibition come about?

DA: The exhibition was first developed for Arnolfini, who invited me to present a solo exhibition. Towner Eastbourne later joined the project, allowing the exhibition to tour across the UK.

A: Your work draws from Islamic and Arab traditions. What first drew you to these historical practices?

DA: I encountered the writings of Edward Said when I was a student at Central Saint Martins, which gave me a new perspective on what it means to be a Middle Eastern artist working in an environment shaped largely by western viewpoints. I became interested in understanding how to engage with genuine expressions of my culture, finding a space for myself outside a lens that fetishises the East and relies on clichés that are often untrue. I grew up immersed in the western canon, so I felt compelled to educate myself in aesthetics and pattern-making rooted in Eastern historical contexts. I pushed myself to study the complex histories of Islamic art and traditional crafts of the region, and fell in love in the process.

A: You often work with skilled, traditional artisans. How do these collaborations shape your vision?

DA: My collaborations with master artisans continually shift my perspective. I am myself a trained craftswoman, and I prefer to work with crafts I know how to practice. Sometimes I begin with an idea and then seek out the process that best supports it. Other times, I am drawn to a specific technique, such as stone carving, which is prevalent in the region, and develop the work from there. At the core of my practice is artisanal rigor, rooted in the handmade. I am deeply invested in ethical modes of production and in what it means to create work that is communal in nature and that actively supports craft communities. 

A: The show explores remembrance and healing. How do you translate memory into material form?

DA: Remembrance is deeply tied to craft forms. They are passed down through generations and are themselves imbued with memory. This memory is also rooted in place though materiality. In Standing by the Ruins, I use clay earth sourced from Saudi Arabia; in other works, I source stone historically used in the regional architecture of Jordan and Syria, or dyes locally foraged from the forests of Thiruvananthapuram in India. There is a poetic language embedded in these materials and their origins.

A: Your practice blends tradition with contemporary issues. How do you maintain that balance?

DA: Finding this balance is difficult. It involves taking craft out of its usual context and innovating with it, so that it does not remain stagnant, but continues to evolve. It is about pushing the limits of the artform.

A: The exhibition’s titular work reconstructs a destroyed bathhouse in Gaza. How do you approach reviving lost architecture through art?

DA: It varies with each project. In some, I work by extracting architectural elements from buildings and transforming them into standalone artworks, such as replicating the patterns of a hammam’s floor tiles. In others, like the Let me Mend Your Broken Bones series, I reference architecture with textiles, a material that is not directly linked to it. There are many ways to approach this. 

A: Your mended fabrics carry a sense of repair. Do you see art as a tool for collective healing?

DA: I don’t see my work being about collective healing or cultural repair. It is more of a personal, cathartic process for me. As someone from the Middle East witnessing the erasure of her cultural history and heritage, my darning works are a way to process that personally. I recognise that I cannot actually mend destroyed buildings or restore what has been lost, but through the darning I find a way to meditate and heal on an individual level. Art can contribute to cultural repair in other ways, but this happens when it moves beyond the art world and engages directly with people affected. The craftspeople I collaborate with are displaced by war and conflict and are bearers of intangible heritage. Supporting them is a far more effective way of healing. It is through the process itself, rather than positioning art as the hero. 

A: Who, or what, are your biggest creative inspirations?

DA: I have many sources of inspiration that inform my work, and I don’t consider any one more important than the others. Ancient architecture, travel and reading poetry and literature from the Middle East are all significant influences. Traditional crafts also inspire me profoundly. Seeing objects created with such perfection, beauty and precision is truly remarkable. Mother-of-pearl inlay from Syria and marble inlay from India are examples, and it is the mastery behind these crafts that I find most inspiring. I also remember seeing Alhambra for the first time and being completely blown away.

A: What do you want visitors to feel or take away from Standing by the Ruins?

DA: The first thing is awareness. I don’t feel people fully know of the extent of destruction happening. The countries of the Levant are rich with multicultural histories, from Byzantine to Roman and Greek influences. These monuments are part of our shared experience, they live beyond us and carry our stories forward. I wish people felt the same outrage for what is being destroyed in the Middle East as they did when Notre Dame burned. Many of these sites predate the Parisian cathedral by centuries.

A: Where will your practice go next? Are there new traditions or sites you’re eager to explore?

DA: There are many crafts I’ve been eager to explore, as I don’t see myself sticking to just one. There are so many techniques I want to try. However, with the ongoing genocide and cultural erasure in Gaza, there is an urgent need to respond. Much of the work I am currently developing is focused on Gaza, addressing these pressing issues and the stories that need to be told.

Standing by the Ruins is at Towner Eastbourne until 25 January: townereastbourne.org.uk

Words: Emma Jacob & Dana Awartani

Image Credits:

1. Come, let me heal your wounds. Let me mend your broken bones, 2024 by Dana Awartani. © Dana Awartani, courtesy the artist and Lisson Gallery, photographer Samuele Cherubini.
2. Installation view of Dana Awartani: Standing by the Ruinsat TownerEastbourne, by Rob Harris.
3. Dana Awartani, Standing by the ruins, Arnolfini June 2025. Lisa Whiting Photography for Arnolfini. All rights reserved.
4. Installation view of Dana Awartani: Standing by the Ruinsat TownerEastbourne, by Rob Harris.
5. Dana Awartani, Standing by the ruins, Arnolfini June 2025. Lisa Whiting Photography for Arnolfini. All rights reserved.
6. Installation view of Dana Awartani: Standing by the Ruinsat TownerEastbourne, by Rob Harris.

The post Dana Awartani: <br> Remembrance Through Craft appeared first on Aesthetica Magazine.

Over recent years, the High Museum has refined a distinctive curatorial approach to fashion, one that avoids both nostalgia and spectacle for spectacle’s sake. Its exhibitions consistently position clothing within wider artistic and cultural conversations, framing dress as a medium capable of expressing ideas about history, identity, performance and labour. This approach has allowed fashion to sit comfortably alongside painting, sculpture and installation rather than occupying a separate, decorative category. Fashion Statements feels like a natural extension of this philosophy, revealing a museum confident in its ability to handle conceptual complexity. The High’s curators trust their audience and allow ideas to unfold without excessive mediation. That confidence underpins the exhibition from the first gallery onwards.

Rather than presenting a chronological retrospective, the exhibition unfolds across eight thematic chapters that reflect Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren’s recurring preoccupations. This structure mirrors the designers’ own practice, which has always resisted linear narratives in favour of repetition and self-reference. Themes such as authorship, abstraction, theatricality and sustainability recur across decades of work, allowing garments from different periods to enter into dialogue. The result is a reading of Viktor & Rolf’s career that feels fluid rather than fixed. Visitors are encouraged to draw connections across time, recognising how ideas evolve rather than disappear. This curatorial decision reinforces the sense of fashion as an ongoing conversation rather than a sequence of isolated moments.

Installation plays a crucial role in shaping this experience and in maintaining coherence across the exhibition. Garments are displayed with sculptural clarity, often isolated to emphasise form, volume and construction. Animated projections by visual effects studio Rodeo FX introduce movement and illusion, subtly extending Viktor & Rolf’s long-standing engagement with performance. Importantly, these elements never overwhelm the clothes themselves but operate in service of them. The balance between immersion and restraint is carefully judged, creating a space that feels theatrical without becoming distracting. It is a testament to the High’s ability to combine innovation with curatorial discipline.

This approach reflects the museum’s broader philosophy regarding fashion. As Director Rand Suffolk has observed: “Just like other important fashion exhibitions presented at the High, ‘Fashion Statements,’ featuring the stunning work of Viktor & Rolf, demonstrates how wearable art is among the most provocative and inventive forms of contemporary design.” The exhibition consistently reinforces this idea, positioning couture as a site of intellectual enquiry rather than mere adornment. Clothing here is not presented as trend-driven or seasonal but as a medium capable of sustaining complex ideas. This framing elevates the garments without removing them from their material reality. It also situates Viktor & Rolf firmly within a lineage of designers who treat fashion as cultural critique.

Since founding their house in the early 1990s, Viktor & Rolf have cultivated a practice defined by contradiction and tension. Their garments consistently stage encounters between romance and severity, excess and control, historical reference and conceptual abstraction. Fashion, for them, functions less as a response to trends and more as a platform for ideas. Each collection begins with an abstract concept that is then developed through meticulous craft and calculated presentation. This commitment to concept places their work in dialogue with designers who have fundamentally reshaped fashion’s expressive possibilities. It also explains the enduring relevance of their practice within both fashion and art contexts.

Their manipulation of silhouette and proportion invites comparison with Rei Kawakubo’s radical rethinking of the dressed body. Like Kawakubo, Viktor & Rolf use distortion and exaggeration to challenge conventional notions of beauty and wearability. However, where Kawakubo often favours austerity and restraint, Viktor & Rolf embrace theatrical excess and visual humour. This difference in tone is significant, marking their work as simultaneously critical and playful. The body becomes a site of experimentation rather than conformity. Their designs resist easy consumption and demand active interpretation.

The performative dimension of Viktor & Rolf’s work further aligns them with designers who have transformed the fashion show into an artistic event. Their runway presentations are carefully constructed performances in which narrative, gesture and staging are integral to meaning. This approach recalls the legacy of Alexander McQueen, whose shows operated as immersive, emotionally charged experiences. Viktor & Rolf, however, often turn the focus back onto fashion itself, interrogating its rituals and hierarchies. Their performances are frequently self-referential, exposing the mechanics of spectacle. The exhibition captures this sensibility through its emphasis on presentation as part of the work.

There is also a persistent attention to craft and process that runs throughout the exhibition. This emphasis recalls Martin Margiela’s interrogation of authorship, labour and materiality. Viktor & Rolf’s upcycled couture in particular engages with similar questions, transforming existing garments into new forms that challenge ideas of originality and value. Construction is never hidden but celebrated, drawing attention to seams, layers and techniques. This anchors the work in material reality, counterbalancing its conceptual ambition. It also underscores the designers’ respect for couture as a discipline rooted in skill and time.

This attention to process is made especially tangible through the inclusion of the designers’ works-in-progress dolls. Inspired by antique porcelain figures and dressed in miniature couture garments, these objects offer an intimate view of Viktor & Rolf’s working methods. They function as studies in scale, precision and repetition, revealing the labour that underpins even the most theatrical pieces. The dolls also introduce a sense of intimacy into the exhibition, contrasting with the monumentality of full-scale garments. In doing so, they reinforce the idea that spectacle and craft are not opposing forces but interdependent. The smallest details carry as much conceptual weight as the grandest silhouettes.

One of the exhibition’s most resonant sections focuses on the Spring Summer 2019 Fashion Statements collection. Here, Viktor & Rolf translate the language of social media into couture form, rendering slogans in layers of laser-cut tulle. These phrases oscillate between sincerity and irony, capturing the designers’ acute awareness of contemporary modes of communication. By transforming fleeting digital language into painstakingly crafted garments, they question the value and permanence of words. The collection exemplifies their ability to engage critically with the present without sacrificing visual impact. It also demonstrates how fashion can operate as social commentary without becoming didactic.

Curator Thierry-Maxime Loriot encapsulates this sensibility when he notes: “The singular and enchanted vision of Viktor & Rolf’s work offers a unique dialogue between art and fashion.” That dialogue is the exhibition’s guiding principle, unfolding across galleries as an experiential rather than theoretical exchange. Garments operate simultaneously as clothing, sculpture and performance, resisting singular interpretation. The exhibition invites viewers to move between these registers, recognising fashion’s multiplicity. Loriot’s thematic structure allows this complexity to emerge organically rather than being imposed. The result is an exhibition that feels intellectually generous as well as visually compelling.

Beyond the gallery, the exhibition highlights Viktor & Rolf’s collaborations with theatre, dance and opera. Their has always existed between disciplines, refusing to be contained by a single medium. Fashion becomes one element within a broader artistic ecology, capable of responding to sound, movement and space. This interdisciplinary impulse feels particularly resonant in a contemporary cultural landscape defined by hybridity. It also reinforces the designers’ belief in fashion as a performative and spatial art. The exhibition integrates these collaborations seamlessly, extending its scope without losing focus.

As Viktor & Rolf. Fashion Statements continues its run, what distinguishes it is its sense of openness. The designers have spoken about the importance of museum exhibitions as democratic spaces, noting that they allow ideas to unfold over time and reach audiences beyond the exclusivity of the runway. That belief is palpable in the High Museum’s presentation, which prioritises access and engagement. This is not an exhibition designed solely for fashion insiders but one that invites reflection from a wide audience. In situating Viktor & Rolf’s work within such a thoughtful curatorial framework, the High affirms both the designers’ enduring influence and its own role as a serious site for fashion discourse.

Viktor&Rolf. Fashion Statements is at High Museum of Art, Atlanta, until 8 February 2026.

high.org

Words: Anna Müller

Image Credits:
1. Mario Sorrenti, Naomi Campbell, NO ready-to-wear collection, A/W 2008–09, V Magazine, 2008. © Mario Sorrenti / Art Partner.
2. AB+DM, Beans S., Paris, 2025, pigmented inkjet print, Scissorhands, Haute Couture collection, Spring/Summer 2024. Commissioned by the High Museum of Art, Gift of Lauren Amos.
3. AB+DM, Alyse Clayton, Paris, 2025, pigmented inkjet print, Angry Birds, Haute Couture collection, Autumn/Winter 2025/26. Commissioned by the High Museum of Art, Gift of Lauren Amos.
4. Philip Riches, Performance of Sculptures, Haute Couture collection, Spring/Summer 2016, polyester and nylon. © Philip Riches.
5. AB+DM, Anyiel Piok Majok, Paris, 2025, pigmented inkjet print, Late Stage Capitalism Waltz, Haute Couture collection, Spring/Summer 2023. Commissioned by the High Museum of Art, Gift of Lauren Amos.
6. AB+DM, Nyibol Dok Jok, Paris, 2025, pigmented inkjet print, Haute Abstraction, Autumn/Winter 2024/25. Commissioned by the High Museum of Art, Gift of Lauren Amos.
7. AB+DM, Zahara B., Paris, 2025, pigmented inkjet print, Surreal Satin, Haute Couture collection, Autumn/Winter 2018/19. Commissioned by the High Museum of Art, Gift of Lauren Amos.
8. AB+DM, Beans S., Paris, 2025, pigmented inkjet print, Scissorhands, Haute Couture collection, Spring/Summer 2024. Commissioned by the High Museum of Art, Gift of Lauren Amos.
9. Claudia Knoepfel & Stefan Indlekofer, Toni, Garrn, 2008, inkjet print on Hahnemühle Photo RagÒ Baryta paper, NO ready-to-wear collection, Autumn/Winter 2008–09. Vogue Germany, 2008. © Claudia Knoepfel & Stefan Indlekofer.

The post Viktor & Rolf: <br> Fashion Statements appeared first on Aesthetica Magazine.

Born in Tokyo in 1957, Ban studied architecture in the United States, a period that profoundly shaped his sensibility. He began at SCI-Arc in Los Angeles, an experimental environment housed in a repurposed warehouse where Ray Kappe encouraged students to test boundaries and rethink materials from the ground up. In 1980 he transferred to Cooper Union in New York, studying under John Hejduk whose poetic, conceptual approach to structure left a lasting imprint. This transcontinental education, bridging the improvisational energy of California with the disciplined formalism of New York, laid the foundation for Ban’s work, in which material experimentation coexists with a deep ethical commitment.

His early professional years began under Arata Isozaki, whose influence is evident in Ban’s sensitivity to structure, proportion and spatial fluidity. In 1985, at twenty-eight, Ban opened his own practice. A decade later he became a consultant to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and founded the Voluntary Architects’ Network, marking the start of a lifelong commitment to humanitarian work. For Ban, architecture has never simply been an exercise in form, rather it is an ethical practice, one that is capable of restoring dignity, offering shelter and rebuilding communities in crisis.

Ban’s emergency structures remain among his most radical and defining contributions to contemporary architecture. The Paper Log House, Paper Partition System and other deployable shelters have been deployed in Haiti,, Japan, Rwanda, Ukraine and countless other sites where natural disasters or conflict created urgent, often overwhelming humanitarian needs. Each intervention demonstrates an extraordinary understanding of how architecture can combine speed, efficiency and human dignity. These shelters are designed to be rapidly assembled, often by residents themselves or with minimal technical expertise, yet they maintain structural integrity and comfort in extreme conditions. Their primary material, paper tubes, is deceptively simple – lightweight, inexpensive, recyclable – yet, through ingenious engineering, becomes remarkably resilient. Arranged in grids or layered forms, these tubes can support walls, floors and even roofs, taking fragile-looking components and transforming them into robust frameworks that are capable of sheltering families and entire communities.

Beyond their physical function, Ban’s designs respond to psychological and social needs. The Paper Partition System, for example, allows large communal spaces to be subdivided into private zones, granting families a measure of personal space in otherwise impersonal relief camps. This attention to spatial dignity reflects a fundamental ethos: that temporary solutions need not compromise humanity. By reimagining a material traditionally associated with ephemerality, Ban subverts conventional hierarchies of material value, demonstrating that architecture’s worth is determined not by cost or permanence but by adaptability, efficiency and the capacity to restore a sense of normalcy in crisis. In Ban’s hands, paper is not merely a building component; it becomes a symbol of resilience, hope and creative problem-solving, a material through which architecture asserts its ethical, humanitarian potential.

The ingenuity of these shelters extends to their environmental and logistical design. Paper tubes are not only recyclable but often locally sourced or easily transported in bulk, minimizing the ecological footprint and logistical challenges of disaster relief. Many of Ban’s designs are modular, allowing them to be scaled up or down depending on the number of people to be housed. In Haiti, families affected by the 2010 earthquake could inhabit units within days, gaining protection from the elements while participating in the construction process themselves, fostering agency and community ownership. In Rwanda and Japan, similar interventions demonstrated that even in contexts of extreme vulnerability, architecture could provide beauty, order and reassurance, proving that emergency structures need not be purely utilitarian or aesthetically barren. These projects illustrate a radical, almost philosophical stance toward architecture: that the discipline’s highest calling may be to respond to human need with both practicality and empathy.

Such humanitarian work stands in dialogue with Ban’s cultural and civic projects. The Centre Pompidou-Metz, completed in 2010, is a masterclass in structural choreography, where a vast timber roof unfurls like a woven canopy. The Simose Art Museum in Hiroshima echoes a similar sensitivity to landscape, materials and light. His pavilions for World Expos, including Hanover 2000 and the upcoming 2025 Osaka edition, demonstrate his capacity to push structural ideas into compelling and often surprising forms. Across each project, whether a museum or a disaster shelter, Ban’s architecture embodies clarity and purpose. At Manggha, visitors encounter this spectrum through models, drawings and documentary materials that reveal the depth of Ban’s process. The exhibition encourages slow, attentive engagement. Hidden details become visible: the precise calibrations of timber joints, the tactility of paper tubes, the layered considerations behind each spatial decision. Rather than presenting Ban solely as a prolific architect, the museum positions him as a thinker whose ideas resonate far beyond the field.

The curatorial framing highlights Ban’s belief that architecture must serve society at all scales. His shelters respond with immediacy, yet also embody long-term thinking about sustainability and material innovation. His cultural institutions define new ways for communities to convene, reflect and participate in public life. This duality reinforces the notion that architectural vision is not limited to monumental projects but includes the capacity to act decisively and compassionately in moments of crisis. Ban’s influence extends into academia. Over the years he has held professorships at numerous universities, sharing insight with emerging architects who increasingly recognise the necessity of socially driven design. His teachings challenge students to consider the lifecycle of materials, the environmental cost of construction and the ethical implications of their decisions. The impact of this pedagogical work is not easily quantified, yet it reverberates across the next generation of practitioners who seek to build with conscience.

Recognition has followed accordingly. Ban received the Pritzker Prize in 2014 for his commitment to humanitarian design and his ability to expand the possibilities of sustainable materials. The award placed him firmly among contemporary architecture’s leading figures, though Ban often redirects praise toward the communities he serves and the teams with whom he collaborates. His humility underscores a larger truth: architecture does not exist in isolation but is part of a broader ecological and social network.

The Manggha exhibition situates Ban’s contributions within this continuum. More than a retrospective, it becomes an inquiry into the evolving role of design in a world reshaped by climate change, conflict and mass migration. As visitors move through the thoughtfully staged works, they are invited to consider how architecture might operate differently, how material innovation might support social resilience and how design can bridge the divide between the urgent and the beautiful. Ban’s work resists binaries, showing that humanitarian solutions can possess elegance, monumental buildings can embody restraint and sustainability can coexist with architectural ambition.

The museum itself becomes an apt lens through which to examine these ideas. Isozaki’s original building was conceived as a gesture of cultural exchange between Japan and Poland, a structure that flows with the logic of water and landscape. Ingarden’s later extension continues this ethos, creating spaces intended not for spectacle but for contemplation. Housing Ban’s work within this architectural lineage reinforces the international dialogue that runs through his practice. In presenting this first chapter of its new programme, Manggha highlights a fundamental truth: buildings can be both visionary and catalytic. They shape not only urban environments, but the ways societies imagine themselves. Ban’s career offers an alternative blueprint, in which design is measured not by extravagance but by its capacity to transform lives. His exhibition in Krakow is a reminder that architecture at its best operates with conscience and creativity, establishing cultural spaces while meeting some of the most critical humanitarian needs of our time.

The result is an exhibition that feels urgent, reflective and optimistic. It positions Shigeru Ban as a pivotal figure whose work argues for a more compassionate architectural future. In doing so, Manggha reaffirms its role as a cultural institution that champions not only aesthetic innovation but the deeper values that underpin design. Through Ban’s example, visitors are invited to consider how architecture can act as a social force, offering both shelter and inspiration in a rapidly changing world.

Shigeru Ban. Architecture and Social Contributions is at Manggha Museum until 3 May 2026.

manggha.pl

Words: Simon Cartwright

Image Credits:
1. Simose Art Museum. Photo: Hiroyuki Hirai.
2. Shishi-iwa House. Photo: Hiroyuki Hirai.
3. Centre Pompidou Metz. Photo: Didier Boy de la Tour.
4. Simose Art Museum. Photo: Hiroyuki Hirai.

The post Shigeru Ban:<br>Architecture for Humanity appeared first on Aesthetica Magazine.

Olivia Locher | Olivia Locher’s most recent projects include a satirical “how-to” series for the 21st century: how to measure up, how to be taller, how to walk on water. In these creative studio shots, Locher considers humanity’s unrealistic desires and aspirations, and presents them to comedic effect. Candles are lit from both ends, cream is poured over ice, jean shorts are stained with melting sprinkles.

Jonathan Knowles | The award-winning advertising photographer presents mundane tasks accomplished with inventive arrangements of candles, wheels and seesaws. Saturated blue dustpans, green cages and pink wafers pop against pastel backdrops. At a time when technology is becoming increasingly autonomous, the pictures ask: what is the place of analogue machines in a digital world?

William Mullen | The Odd Apples series contains 90 still lifes, representing four years and three seasons of researching, reading, finding, tasting and photographing. In these surreal, and sometimes farcical images, Mullan offer hyper-stylised aesthetics, focusing on the fruit that has symbolised knowledge and power – both literally and metaphorically – across different cultures and locations for centuries.

Pia Kintrup | The horror vacui series comprises still life photographs in a state of dissolution. Each composition pairs organic and non-organic items, including leftover packaging from boiled sweets, onion skins, cardboard boxes, coconut shells, egg cartons, plastic bags and pistachio shells. The images are at once melancholy and indulgent, resting in the moments after purchasing, unwrapping and consuming.

Andoni Beristain | Andoni Beristain is fascinated with shape, colour and observing the world. He combines big-scale outdoor still life and curated studio photographs, with a goal to “make people wonder, look beyond and, above all, appreciate the good things.” The artist’s latest series, Pieze Madre (Mother Piece), is a homage to his mother, Ángeles Isidora Zabalo, who passed away in 2022.

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Image Credits:

1. Andoni Beristain, Vintage, (2021). Courtesy of the artist.
2. Olivia Locher, How To Make Ice-cream (2015). Courtesy of the artist.
3. Olivia Locher, How To Be Taller (2014). Courtesy of the artist.
4. Jonathan Knowles, from Trajectories. Art Direction: Lauren Catten for Getty Images. Set Design: Kyle Bean. Retoucher: Gareth Pritchard.
5. Pink Pearl (California, USA). From the series Odd Apples. Photographer: William Mullen. Designer: A.A. Trabucco-Campos.
6. Porter’s Perfection (Somerset, England). From the series Odd Apples. Photographer: William Mullen. Designer: A.A. Trabucco-Campos.
7. Pia Kintrup, Gelbe Zwiebelfolie / Yellow Onion Skin from horror vacui.
8. Andoni Beristain, Fruit Tower, (2021). Courtesy of the artist.
9. Andoni Beristain, Banana Móvil, (2021). Courtesy of the artist.

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Film

Film stands out as one of the most dynamic and compelling areas of contemporary art and our 2025 Main Prize winner works in this medium. Tobi Onabolu was named overall winner for Danse Macabre, a piece that explores spirituality, mental health and the human psyche. It combines poetry, music, archival audio and movement to represent the conscious and unconscious mind. Dancers, singers and unseen voices animate this portrait of healing and expanded awareness. Also in this category was Hussina Raja’s STATION, which traces South Asian and Caribbean heritage in London; the collaborative work Time Pops Like Chewing Gum by Adam Cain, Lois Macdonald, and Princess Arinola Adegbite, exploring AI, technology and disconnection; and Sarah Maple’s video mimicking 1980s language tapes, highlighting how a lack of communication between generations can become a painful barrier to belonging.

Painting & Mixed Media

Our shortlisted painting and mixed media works foreground process, material and subject matter, using surface and texture to address lived experience. Artists draw on still life, landscape and portraiture, as well as photography, text and found materials, to explore themes of memory, heritage and environmental change. Artist Stephen Johnston’s incredible photorealist paintings capture fragile blooms suspended in jars, set against black voids. The still life represent a mediation of memory and impermanence. Johnston’s refined technique draws attention to detail and transience, reminding viewers of what persists and what slips away. In mixed media, Sof transforms mosaic into a living surface. Magnetic fields, matter and light shift and respond, making each experience unique. Geo 1 asks audiences to consider themselves as part of the work – both observer and performer – as time, touch and energy shape the final form.

Digital Art

This year, Digital art emerged as a vital thread across the Prize, reflecting how technology increasingly shapes perception, labour and intimacy. Bart Nelissen’s Datascapes examines how humans innately try to translate chaos into order. The artist reduces digital cloudscapes into geometric fragments – squares pulled from larger images, each representing a bit of data. Intersecting image layers transform data into information, revealing hidden patterns. The work addresses the overwhelming accumulation of digital data and our collective effort to extract meaning from it. Meanwhile, Brendan Dawes was shortlisted for Nothing Can Ever Be The Same,  a 168-hour real-time generative film made alongside filmmaker Gary Hustwit. Using bespoke generative technology developed for the Academy Award-shortlisted documentary Eno, the film continuously evolves, ensuring no two versions are ever alike. 

Photography

An every-popular aspect of the Prize, this year’s shortlisted photographers turned the camera towards landscapes shaped by environmental change, communities marked by migration and labour, and bodies historically misrepresented or overlooked. Àsìkò examines migration and cultural memory in New World Giants, whilst Joanne Coates’ multi-part installation The Object, Pen with Tattoo, The Portrait and The Vinyl reflects on working-class landscapes in rural England. Ellie Davies, Michelle Blancke and Liz Miller Kovacs respond to ecological fragility and the evolving relationship between humans and land. Sujata Setia’s moving series, A Thousand Cuts, explores patterns of domestic abuse within South Asian culture, drawing on “Lingchi” – an ancient torture methods – to reflect the soul-eroding nature of repeated harm. Survivors’ portraits are physically cut with a knife, symbolising their lived experiences.

Sculpture & Installation

Sculpture and installation transform space itself, inviting viewers to move through, around and even interact with the work. At York Art Gallery, our shortlisted artists created moments of engagement and reflecting, taking art off the walls to challenge assumptions about form and presence. Rayvenn Shaleigha D’Clark challenges historical portrayals of Black anatomy by reconstructing the Black body with precision and dignity. Her silicone sculpture emerges from a three-month process dedicated to capturing anatomical detail, nuance and presence. This year’s Emerging Prize went to Sam Metz, whose sculpture Porosity reflects their sensory experience of the Humber Estuary. Bright yellow structures echo how they see the water’s reflection through ocular albinism, a genetic eye condition that causes visual differences.

The Aesthetica Art Prize is Open for Entries. Win £10,000 & Exhibition. Submit Your Work.

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“I have always wanted to be a filmmaker. My slideshows are films made up of stills,” Goldin has said. The exhibition gives these films room to breathe. Each installation occupies a structure designed by Hala Wardé, tailored to the scale and emotional tenor of the work it houses. The result is a series of interconnected spaces where memory, intimacy and trauma are explored without hierarchy, and where the boundaries between life and art, observer and observed, dissolve. The exhibition’s title, This Will Not End Well, suggests a dark and  foreboding atmosphere, yet it also carries warmth and irony, echoing Goldin’s enduring vitality and her capacity to find joy in even the darkest of moments.

The Ballad of Sexual Dependency (1981–2022), Goldin’s defining work, charts her friends and lovers over decades, capturing moments of vulnerability, desire and fleeting joy. First shown in underground clubs and alternative venues in New York, it has evolved continuously, layering new images and sounds. Goldin’s approach to intimacy aligns her with contemporaries such as Cindy Sherman, whose self-portraits interrogate identity, and Sophie Calle, whose work investigates personal boundaries. Yet her images are distinguished by their empathy and a refusal to separate private life from the social currents shaping it.

The Other Side (1992–2021) pays homage to her trans friends, documenting them across decades with sensitivity and dignity. Photography becomes both archive and witness, a means of preserving lives often excluded from mainstream history. In this sense, Goldin’s practice resonates with artists such as Carrie Mae Weems and other documentarians who insist on visibility as a political and aesthetic act. Sisters, Saints, Sibyls (2004–2022) confronts familial trauma and suicide, restaged in the “Cubo” at Pirelli HangarBicocca with its soaring 20-metre ceiling. The installation retains its original power, including two wax figures – a girl in a bed and a man on a stand—viewed from above. Elsewhere, Fire Leap (2010–2022) explores childhood, Memory Lost (2019–2021) navigates drug withdrawal, and Sirens (2019–2020) captures ecstasy and its perils. These works reveal Goldin’s unflinching attention to life’s extremes.

In Milan, two new slideshows debut. You Never Did Anything Wrong (2024), Goldin’s first abstract work, meditates on myth, eclipses and life cycles, while Stendhal Syndrome (2024) engages Ovid’s Metamorphosis, juxtaposing mythological narratives with portraits of friends. The result is a dialogue across time between personal experience and historical reference, underscoring Goldin’s enduring curiosity.

Sound is central to the exhibition. Visitors encounter a new installation, Bleeding (2025), by Soundwalk Collective, whose work with Goldin includes projects such as the Golden Lion-winning documentary All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (2022). Using field recordings from previous iterations of her exhibitions, the sound installation continuously recomposes through a custom instrument suspended in the space, saturating the architecture with shifting tonalities. Visitors move through a landscape of sight and sound, entering Goldin’s cinematic village and experiencing her work as a multi-sensory environment.

Goldin’s influence stretches beyond galleries. Her diaristic, intimate style has reshaped fashion photography and visual culture, foregrounding authenticity, vulnerability and the personal as political. Contemporary photographers such as Petra Collins and Tina Barney share this commitment to visibility and intimacy, yet Goldin’s work maintains a singular tension between revelation and restraint. Activism is inseparable from Goldin’s practice. She founded P.A.I.N. (Prescription Addiction Intervention Now) in 2017, holding the Sackler family accountable for their role in the opioid crisis. Works like Memory Lost are inseparable from this engagement, demonstrating art’s potential to effect cultural change.

In Milan, Goldin’s work is presented with unparalleled ambition. Curated by Roberta Tenconi with Lucia Aspesi, the exhibition situates the slideshows in dialogue with architecture, sculpture and sound. Spaces echo La Chapelle de la Salpêtrière, Paris, where Sisters, Saints, Sibyls was first shown, allowing visitors to move through the forty-year arc of Goldin’s career. Ceiling heights, wax figures and ambient sound all enhance the narrative, producing an experience that is contemplative, sensory and profoundly human.

This Will Not End Well is an encounter with Goldin’s life-long practice, cinematic, architectural and immersive. It positions her alongside transformative female artists while underscoring her singularity, confronting the fragility of life, the persistence of memory and the power of bearing witness. Goldin’s slideshows, films made of stills, become portals into lived experience, illustrating the fluidity of medium and the continuum of human experience. As visitors navigate the exhibition, they traverse moments of love, euphoria, trauma and addiction, punctuated by Goldin’s ironic humour and tenderness. The work refuses neat closure, instead reflecting life’s unpredictability while affirming human connection. Milan’s installation offers a space in which the personal and collective, the intimate and the monumental, coexist, making the exhibition both a culmination and a revelation. Ultimately, This Will Not End Well is ambitious, immersive and humane. Goldin appears as filmmaker, chronicler, activist and poet, inviting audiences to inhabit her world, witness her gaze and reflect on the fragility and resilience of life. For those familiar with her work, it consolidates her legacy; for newcomers, it provides an unforgettable introduction. Across four decades and multiple continents, Nan Goldin continues to stand as a defining force in contemporary art, documenting life’s extremes and subtleties with empathy, courage and clarity.

This Will Not End Well is at Pirelli HangarBicocca, Milan, until 15 February.

pirellihangarbicocca.org

Words: Anna Müller

Image Credits:
1. Nan Goldin, Sunny in my room, Paris, 2009 © Nan Goldin. Courtesy Gagosian.
2. Nan Goldin, Picnic on the Esplanade, Boston, 1973 © Nan Goldin. Courtesy Gagosian.
2. Nan Goldin, Brian and Nan in Kimono, 1983 © Nan Goldin. Courtesy Gagosian.
3. Nan Goldin, Sunny in my room, Paris, 2009 © Nan Goldin. Courtesy Gagosian.
4. Nan Goldin, C as Madonna in the dressing room, Bangkok, 1992 © Nan Goldin. Courtesy Gagosian.

The post Nan Goldin: <br> Intimacy and Memory appeared first on Aesthetica Magazine.

January | Marshmallow Laser Feast: Of the Oak, Yorkshire Sculpture Park
Until 15 March

A single oak tree can support more than 2,300 species: lichens clinging to bark, birds nesting in branches, butterflies drifting through leaves and a vast underground network of fungi. In Of the Oak, experiential artist collective Marshmallow Laser Feast (MLF) makes this extraordinary biodiversity visible. They have created a “digital double” of Kew Gardens’ majestic Lucombe Oak – one of its oldest trees – using LiDAR, radar and CT-scanning. The resulting video and sound experience is enchanting and educational, showing how energy and carbon flow into the soil, whilst aiming to inspire a renewed connection with nature.

ysp.org.uk

February | Chiharu Shiota: Threads of Life, Hayward Gallery
17 February – 3 May

Japanese visual artist Chiharu Shiota (b. 1972) is best-known for constructing large-scale installations which engulf ordinary objects – such as shoes, keys, beds, chairs, doors and dresses – within huge webs of thread. Hayward Gallery’s top floor will be transformed by a number of Shiota’s signature works, which often employ red or white wool. They are displayed alongside new large-scale sculptures, drawings, early performance videos and photographs. These works are technical marvels. But they are also full of emotion, drawing from personal experience to touch on universally resonant themes of life, death and relationships.

southbankcentre.co.uk

March | Tracey Emin, Tate Modern
27 February – 31 August

In 1998, Tracey Emin (b. 1963) was catapulted into the public eye with My Bed – a raw, confessional piece that challenged assumptions of what art could be. It was a landmark moment. Now, nearly 30 years on, Tate Modern surveys Emin’s practice. From painting to neon, this exhibition revels in the artist’s unapologetic self-expression, navigating themes of passion, pain and healing. It is part of Tate Modern’s wider 2026 programme, which includes Cuban-born American artist Ana Mendieta (14 July – 17 January), as well as Light and Magic (14 October – 21 February), which will chart the history of art photography.

tate.org.uk

April | Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2026, The Photographers’ Gallery
6 March – 7 June

The Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize, established in 1996, celebrates exhibitions and publications that have made “a significant contribution to photography in the past 12 months.” The 2026 shortlist – Amak Mahmoodian, Jane Evelyn Atwood, Rene Matić and Weronika Gęsicka – demonstrates the wide-reaching nature of photography today, from long-term investigative documentary to installation, video and sound. Their projects navigate pressing themes: exile and memory; gender inequalities and advocacy; identity and belonging, subculture and class; and the boundaries between fact and fiction.

thephotographersgallery.org.uk

May | The Music Is Black: A British Story, V&A East Museum
From 18 April

The Music is Black: A British Story is the first landmark exhibition from V&A East Museum, opening in April 2026 at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. It celebrates 125 years of Black music in Britain, surveying genres from jazz to reggae, 2-tone, drum & bass, trip hop, UK garage, grime and beyond. In so doing, it reveals how Black British music has shaped culture on both national and global scales, telling “a story of struggle, resilience and joy.” This is a chance to learn more about early 20th century pioneers whilst enjoying the work of today’s groundbreaking artists – from Sampha to Little Simz, Jorja Smith, Ezra Collective and more.

vam.ac.uk

June | John Akomfrah: Listening All Night To The Rain, National Museums Liverpool
16 May – 31 August

John Akomfrah (b. 1957) is recognised for his immersive multi-channel film installations, which explore major issues including racial injustice, colonial legacies, diasporic identities, migration and climate change. Next spring, Walker Art Gallery will showcase a new work, commissioned by the British Council for the 2024 Venice Biennale. Listening All Night To The Rain gives voice to individuals representing the British diaspora, adopting a non-linear view of time that connects different places and time periods. Here, Akomfrah focuses in on the power of sound – encouraging audiences to listen as a form of activism.

liverpoolmuseums.org.uk

July | Project a Black Planet: The Art and Culture of Panafrica, Barbican Centre
11 June – 6 September

The term Pan-Africanism refers to a broad spectrum of political and philosophical movements advocating anti-colonial resistance and transnational solidarity amongst peoples of African descent. Project a Black Planet is the first exhibition to consider its influence on both visual art and culture, featuring contributions from Chris Ofili, Kerry James Marshall, Marlene Dumas and Simone Leigh. It features more than 300 works, spanning from the 1920s to the present, produced across Africa, Brazil, the Caribbean, North America and western Europe. Here, Panafrica is presented “not as a fixed territory but as a conceptual terrain where rupture, dissent and collective imagination converge in the pursuit of emancipatory futures.”

barbican.org.uk

August | Catherine Opie: To Be Seen, Royal Scottish Academy
8 August – 1 November

To Be Seen will arrive in Edinburgh in August, following a run at London’s National Portrait Gallery earlier in the year. It’s a huge moment, marking the first major museum exhibition of Catherine Opie’s (b. 1961) work to be shown in the UK, and her first-ever solo show in Scotland. The display spans 30 years and includes the seminal work Being and Having (1991), showing the artist’s close friends in the West Coast’s LGBTQ+ community. There are also self-portraits, as well as pictures inspired by Hans Holbein and the Baroque. This is essential viewing, prompting questions around “the who, why and how of portraits.”

nationalgalleries.org

September | Catwalk: The Art of the Fashion Show, V&A Dundee
3 April – 17 January

Alexander McQueen. Balenciaga. Chanel. Dior. Louis Vuitton. These are just some of the major fashion houses included in Catwalk. The exhibition, a UK exclusive to V&A Dundee, charts the evolution of fashion shows, from private 19th century salons to today’s live-streamed experiences. Audiences will come face-to-face with unforgettable runway moments that have had lasting cultural impact, including Karl Lagerfeld’s 35-metre-tall rocket ship, which launched 10 metres into the air in 2017. Plus, who could forget McQueen’s robot-painted dress from 1999? Catwalk is a celebration of artistry, innovation and spectacle.

vam.ac.uk

October | Es Devlin, The Design Museum
18 September – 11 April

2026 feels like a year of firsts, and the Es Devlin (b. 1971) show at the Design Museum is no exception. It’s the first museum show in the UK dedicated to the artist’s work, which spans stage designs to huge art installations. Devlin has made her name through collaborations in theatre and opera, as well as Olympic ceremonies, Superbowl half-time shows and monumental stadium sculptures in collaboration with some of the world’s most celebrated musicians. Plus, for the past decade, she has been focused on making public art for galleries including the Serpentine and Tate Modern. This show is an insight into an extraordinary career.

designmuseum.org

November | The 90s, Tate Britain
8 October – 14 February

Edward Enninful OBE is the former Editor of British Vogue and one of the most influential voices in fashion culture today. He’s curated The 90s, an upcoming show at Tate Britain which “examines a seminal decade in which a groundswell of creativity changed the face of British culture.” It features iconic images by photographers Corrine Day, David Sims, Juergen Teller and Nick Knight, which will be shown alongside the work of artists like Damien Hirst, Gillian Wearing and Yinka Shonibare. Plus, fashion collections by decade-defining designers including Alexander McQueen, Hussein Chalayan and Vivienne Westwood.

tate.org.uk

December | Sunil Gupta: Life With a Camera, 1970 – Now, Kettle’s Yard
19 September – 31 January

Sunil Gupta (b. 1953) has made an incredible contribution to photography over the past five decades. His work has been instrumental in raising awareness around the fight for queer rights, particularly in India and the UK. Life With a Camera features more than 130 works, including Friends and Lovers (1970s), showing Gupta’s social life in Montreal; Christopher Street (1976), capturing New York’s queer community post-Stonewall riots; Mr Malhotra’s Party (2007-2012), which covers a period of lobbying to change anti-gay laws in India; and Dissent and Desire (with Charan Singh, 2015), chronicling contemporary LGBTQ+ life in Delhi. 

kettlesyard.cam.ac.uk

Words: Eleanor Sutherland

Image Credits:
1. The Key in the Hand, 2015 Installation: old keys, wooden boats, red wool. Japan Pavilion at 56th Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy. Photo by Sunhi Mang. © DACS, London, 2025 and Chiharu Shiota
2. Of the Oak, by Marshmallow Laser Feast at Yorkshire Sculpture Park. Image: Mark Reeves.
3. The Locked Room, 2016, Installation: old keys, wooden doors, red wool KAAT Kanagawa Arts Theatre, Yokohama, Japan Photo by Masanobu Nishino and courtesy of the artist © DACS, London, 2025 and Chiharu Shiota
4. Tracey Emin, I whisper to My Past Do I have Another Choice, 2010 © Tracey Emin.
5. Weronika Gęsicka, Argusto Emfazie, from the ‘Encyclopaedia’ series, 2023-2025. Courtesy of the artist and Jednostka Gallery.
6. Sepia Butterfly, London, 1993 © Jennie Baptiste
7. John Akomfrah Canto IV, Listening All Night To The Rain, British Pavilion 2024. © Smoking Dogs Films, All Rights Reserved, DACS 2025. Photo: Jack Hems
8. Simone Leigh, Dunham, 2017. The Art Institute of Chicago, purchased with funds provided by Marilyn and Larry Fields; Claire and Gordon Prussian Fund for Contemporary Art. © 2017 Simone Leigh. Photographer: Jonathan Mathias.
9. Pig Pen, 1993. Catherine Opie © Catherine Opie. Courtesy the artist, Regen Projects, Los Angeles and Thomas Dane Gallery.
10. Chanel Fashion Show Fall-Winter 2017. © Helmut Fricke.
11. Egg, by Es Devlin 2018 © Nikolas Koenig.
12. Juergen Teller, Young Pink Kate, London 1998 © Juergen Teller, All rights Reserved.
13. Sunil Gupta, Diepiriye (2007). Images courtesy the artists and Hales Gallery, Materià Gallery, SepiaEye, Stephen Bulger Gallery and Vadehra Art Gallery. © Sunil Gupta and Charan Singh. All Rights Reserved, DACS 2025.

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Her career has been defined by an unceasing desire to expand the vocabulary of fashion. Unlike many designers who adhere to conventional silhouettes and techniques, Van Herpen approaches each collection as a multidisciplinary exploration, weaving together elements of science, architecture and technology. Collaborations with architects, engineers and scientists are central to her practice, allowing her to translate the intangible forces of nature into wearable art and blurring the boundaries between garment and sculpture. Whether through 3D printing, laser cutting or handblown glass, her creations challenge perceptions of the body, the material and the very definition of couture.

Kunsthal Rotterdam has devoted its largest hall to a retrospective that encapsulates this extraordinary career. Sculpting the Senses presents over one hundred iconic creations, offering an immersive experience that engages visitors on multiple sensory levels. The exhibition is structured across nine thematic zones, a 21st-century cabinet of curiosities and a meticulous recreation of the designer’s Amsterdam atelier. A bespoke soundscape by Salvador Breed accompanies the visitor, heightening the interplay between fashion, art and science while the layout encourages contemplation of the body in space, the interaction between garments and environment and the future of human form in a rapidly shifting world.

At the core of her work is a deep connection to nature. The Crystallization collection captures water in its liquid, frozen and vapourous states, a motif that evokes both fragility and force. It includes her first 3D printed garment, marking a pivotal moment in the intersection of technology and couture. In the Sensory Seas collection, the human nervous system is likened to the currents and structures of the ocean. Through delicate layering of translucent fabrics, the creations evoke the graceful ebb and flow of subaquatic life, a poetic meditation on the interconnection between life forms. Fascination with natural forces extends beyond the ocean. In Earth Rise, garments incorporate upcycled plastics, transforming waste into beauty and reflecting a commitment to sustainability. Explorations of growth systems beneath the earth are expressed through translucent lace layers and sculptural structures, suggesting the hidden complexity of natural ecosystems and creating a dialogue between the visible and unseen worlds.

Architecture and anatomical studies are further pillars of Van Herpen’s practice. Gothic cathedrals, with their rib vaults and buttresses, inform pieces in which structural logic merges with sculptural elegance. Synaesthesia and multisensory experience play a central role. In the Hypnosis dress, laser-cut patterns refract movement and light, creating an optical effect that transforms the perception of the body itself. Her creations become a second skin, simultaneously scientific study and artistic projection, inviting the audience to reconsider the corporeal form. The work is also suffused with a sense of mythology and the fantastical. Growing up near the home of Hieronymus Bosch, Van Herpen absorbed a world in which alchemy, mysticism and surreal allegory intermingle. Symbolist and surrealist literature alongside studies of historical cabinets of curiosities inform her imaginative approach. Her collections explore the fluid boundaries between reality and imagination, elevating fashion into a medium for narrative and metaphor.

Her practice resonates with contemporaries who occupy similar interdisciplinary spaces, such as Neri Oxman, whose architectural and biological experiments echo her integration of science into design and Philip Beesley, whose responsive architectural installations parallel the kinetic fluidity of her garments. Unlike many avant-garde designers who lean exclusively on conceptual or technological experimentation, Van Herpen maintains a dialogue with the rich lineage of couture, combining technical mastery with visionary artistry, ensuring her work retains both emotional resonance and precision. In collections that explore the intersection of technology and life sciences, the body is transformed into hybrid forms that appear futuristic yet intimately connected to the natural world. Fascination with the cosmos, often informed by scientific imagery from NASA alongside ethereal artistic references, positions these designs as both scientific and poetic investigations. The exhibition’s finale, with dresses appearing to float through space, captures this synthesis, offering a spectacle that is immersive, contemplative and transcendent.

Sculpting the Senses is an invitation to experience fashion as an evolving multisensory phenomenon. Creations engage with materiality, movement, mythology and science, questioning the limits of clothing and the role of the designer in contemporary culture. The legacy of this work is significant not only in fashion but in art, architecture and design, establishing a model for interdisciplinary practice that is rigorous, poetic and socially engaged. By navigating the intersections of traditional craftsmanship and cutting-edge technology, couture becomes a space for experimentation, reflection and dialogue about our relationship to nature, technology and the body. The collaboration behind this exhibition underscores its ambition. Organised by Kunsthal Rotterdam with Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris and Maison Iris van Herpen, the presentation is based on the original exhibition design by the Parisian institution. Visitors can anticipate a meticulously curated journey punctuated by multisensory installations, sculptural garments and dialogues with contemporary artists and designers. These conversations highlight her work’s position at the nexus of contemporary practice, where fashion, art and science intersect.

Iris van Herpen’s journey from a small Dutch village to the pinnacle of global haute couture is a testament to the power of curiosity, collaboration and innovation. Sculpting the Senses offers not only a reflection on an extraordinary career but also a vision of fashion’s future: one in which the boundaries between disciplines dissolve and the body becomes a canvas for exploration, transformation and imagination. In an era defined by rapid technological change and ecological uncertainty, this work embodies a rare synthesis of beauty, intellect and ethical consciousness, demonstrating that the act of dressing can be both art and inquiry, spectacle and meditation, an invitation to inhabit a world where imagination and reality converge.

Sculpting Senses is at Kunsthal Rotterdam until 1 March 2026.

kunsthal.nl

Words: Anna Müller

Image Credits:
1. Iris van Herpen. ‘Crystallization’ top, Crystallization collection, Haute Couture, 2010. Utilising selective laser-sintering 3D printing technologies, made from polyamide Photo by Sølve Sundsbø Model: Kyona van Santen.
2.Iris van Herpen. Syntopia collection, Haute Couture fall/winter 2018-19. Bird soundwave patterns, laser cut of stainless steel Photo by Sølve Sundsbø Model: Sabah Koj Photo by David Uzochukwu Model: Cynthia Arrebola.
3. Iris van Herpen. Morphogenesis dress, Sensory Seas collection, Haute Couture spring/summer White screen-printing mesh layers, in collaboration with Phillip Beesley Photo by David Uzochukwu Model: Yue Han.
4. Iris van Herpen. Crystallization collection, Haute Couture 2010. Transparent PetG heat molded into a motion capture of splashing water Photo by Sølve Sundsbø Model: Elza Matiz.
5. Iris van Herpen. Labyrinthine kimono dress, Sensory Seas collection, Haute Couture spring/summer 2020. 3D laser cut silk dendrites heat bonded to leaves of black transparent glass- organza. Photo by David Uzochukwu. Model: Cynthia Arrebola.
6.Iris van Herpen. ‘Crystallization’ top, Crystallization collection, Haute Couture, 2010. Utilising selective laser-sintering 3D printing technologies, made from polyamide Photo by Sølve Sundsbø Model: Kyona van Santen.

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