Overview
- Opening December 7 at NGV International and running through April 19, the ticketed exhibition pairs Vivienne Westwood with Rei Kawakubo in a curated conversation.
- Curators frame the presentation as a study of shared convictions — questioning authority, rethinking gender and reworking history — expressed through divergent design languages.
- The show is organised into five thematic rooms: punk and provocation, rupture, reinvention, the body, and the power of clothes.
- Iconic pieces include Westwood’s tartan wedding gown modelled by Kate Moss, the 2007 Wake Up/Cave Girl dress, and Comme des Garçons’ autumn/winter 2016 Blood and Roses works.
- Context points to 1981’s twin ‘Pirates’ collections as a pivotal year of rupture for both largely self‑taught designers who rose outside the traditional French atelier system.