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An evening of art and fashion presented by the Richard R. Brettell Lecture Series
Step into Impressionist Paris with an evening of art and fashion. Begin your night with French-inspired dishes in the cafe, visit the new exhibition Berthe Morisot, Woman Impressionist, learn about the fashion trends present in Morisot's paintings and what they tell us about late 19th-century French society, and see the fashions come to life in a runway show featuring re-creations of period garments by fashion design students at the Art Institute of Dallas.
DMA Cafe
5:00–7:00 p.m., Atrium
Start your evening with drink specials and classic French dishes in the DMA Cafe.
Talk
Morisot and the Parisienne: Fashion and Art in Impressionist Paris
7:00–8:00 p.m., Horchow Auditorium
Berthe Morisot’s paintings of modern life center on the lives of women more than those of her Impressionist colleagues. A fashionable Parisienne herself, Morisot depicted other women of her social class at home and at the seaside, in gardens and on verandas. These settings echoed those commonly featured in fashion imagery of the period, but she also included figures not typically seen, like fathers, servants, and nannies. This talk will start to decode Morisot’s images, telling us about the individuals depicted based on their dress and setting. Who are these modern women and what are they doing? Morisot’s paintings and her career as a woman Impressionist simultaneously fulfilled and defied expectations. Nineteenth-century fashion trends, social etiquette, and art criticism dramatically shaped Morisot’s art and life and offer fascinating context for our understanding of them today.
Dr. Justine De Young is Assistant Professor in the History of Art Department at the Fashion Institute of Technology, State University of New York. Her research focuses on the intersection of art and fashion, with a special interest in the 19th and 20th centuries. Dr. De Young is the editor of Fashion in European Art: Dress and Identity, Politics and the Body, 1775–1925, and she contributed to the exhibition Impressionism, Fashion & Modernity at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Musée d’Orsay, and Art Institute of Chicago. She has held fellowships at the Met’s Costume Institute, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and Northwestern’s Mary & Leigh Block Museum of Art, and she holds degrees from Northwestern University and Williams College.
Fashion Show
8:00–8:30 p.m., Horchow Auditorium
See the fashions of the Parisienne come to life in a runway show featuring designs by students at the Art Institute of Dallas. After the show, enjoy a meet and greet with the students and see their designs up close. Featuring work by QuoDarious Wesley, Melissa Bransom, London Vance, Maria Ewins, Belsy Rayo, and Eunice Hernandez.
This talk is part of our Spring Fashion Series.
Image: Berthe Morisot, Reclining Woman in Gray, 1879, oil on canvas, private collection, Photo: Studio Thierry Jacob