CULTURE

HOW TO SHOP ‘CAMP’ BEFORE THE MET GALA

WORDS

by JEENA SHARMA

PHOTOGRAPHY

COURTESY of

THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART

Put down your thinking caps. The Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute’s Spring 2019 exhibition theme has been announced. Camp: Notes on Fashion that is set to open May 9, 2019 running through September.

Built around Susan Sontag’s seminal 1964 essay “Notes on ‘Camp,” the exhibition will examine how fashion designers have used their métier as a vehicle to engage with camp in a myriad of compelling, humorous, and sometimes incongruous ways.

“Fashion is the most overt and enduring conduit of the camp aesthetic,” said Andrew Bolton, Wendy Yu Curator in Charge of The Costume Institute. "Effectively illustrating Sontag's Notes on 'Camp,' the exhibition will advance creative and critical dialogue about the ongoing and ever-evolving impact of camp on fashion."

The exhibition will be preceded by the coveted MET Gala, which will be co-chaired by Lady Gaga, Alessandro Michele, Harry Styles, Serena Williams, and Anna Wintour. The event is The Costume Institute's main source of annual funding for exhibitions, publications, acquisitions, and capital improvements.

“Camp's disruptive nature and subversion of modern aesthetic values has often been trivialized, but this exhibition will reveal its profound influence on both high art and popular culture,” said Max Hollein, Director of The Met. “By tracing its evolution and highlighting its defining elements, the show will embody the ironic sensibilities of this audacious style, challenge conventional understandings of beauty and taste, and establish the critical role this important genre has played in the history of art and fashion.”

The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute presents Camp: Notes on Fashion

Ensemble by Virgil Abloh for Off-White, pre-fall 2018 (image courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Photo © Johnny Dufort, 2018)

“Camp’s disruptive nature and subversion of modern aesthetic values has often been trivialized, but this exhibition will reveal its profound influence on both high art and popular culture”

– Max Hollein –

Franco Moschino for House of Moschino, spring/summer 1991 (image courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Photo © Johnny Dufort, 2018)

Camp: Notes on Fashion, which was made possible by Gucci with additional support from Conde Nast, will be presented in The Met Fifth Avenue’s Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Exhibition Hall, and explore the origins of the camp aesthetic and how it has evolved from a place of marginality to become an important influence on mainstream culture.

But what exactly is ‘Camp’ and how do you shop it?

According to Sontag, Camp finds its origins in the unnatural and exaggerated.

Not to be confused with “kitsch” or anything garish, Camp is much more abstracted and nuanced. But that can be understandably confusing for those hoping to nail the style before the Met Gala next year.

To help you begin and narrow down your search, we've curated a list of definite camp-y essentials.

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