Signature silhouettes
Master couturier Balenciaga gets a haute show at the Kimbell
Cristóbal Balenciaga may have worked in the realm of haute couture, but he was first and foremost a virtuosic sculptor who formed fabric into spiritual symphonies of light and shadow. One doesn’t have to step far into “Balenciaga in Black,” a hot ticket this fall at Fort Worth’s Kimbell Art Museum, to see why Christian Dior called him “the master of us all” and Coco Chanel once said, “all the rest are just designers.” The exhibition’s first masterpiece looks deceptively minimal — a strapless, body-hugging, bias-cut, wool crepe evening gown from 1950 that is the definition of purity. No sequins, lace, fur or flashy draping needed. And it would still rock the most exclusive gala today. Then comes a cocktail dress from 1967 that gets its tapered cone shape from deep folds of bias-cut gazar, wide open at the top save for the rhinestone and pearlescent bead straps that seem to hold it together. Only the most adventurous doyenne would even think about wearing such a dress. Definitely not for a sit-down dinner, but spectacularly elegant and clearly the work of a visionary. Those two pieces, like most of the show’s designs, are from the prime years of Balenciaga’s life, which were spent in Paris. But his heart never left the Basque fishing village of Getaria, where he was born and where his mother taught him to sew. She was a seamstress for the Marchioness of Casa Torres, who would become one of his earliest patrons. Balenciaga opened his first workshop in the resort town of San Sebastián, Spain, at 22. Within a decade he established his boutique Eisa, which eventually had three locations. He moved to Paris in his early 40s, during opening the his Spanish Balenciaga Civil store War, and staging his first runway show there in 1937. The oldest outfit of “Balenciaga in Black” is from that era — a crepe dress and bolero ensemble that, frankly, is a bit of a “meh” compared to the breakout creations unveiled in later decades, when he would introduce one revolutionary silhouette after another: The barrel line. The balloon. The semi-fitted suit. The tunic dress. The sack dress. All of those landmark designs, and more, appear in the show, which features more than 100 pieces from the Balenciaga Archives and Palais Galliera (the fashion museum of Paris), plus a few pieces from the University of North Texas collection. The opening room devoted to sketches and construction illustrates Balenciaga’s process. It’s worth spending time there, despite the eye-candy that beckons beyond, to see how the designer used signature black toiles, or patterns; took assiduous notes; and strategically composed the underlayers of linings to support the effects he aimed to achieve. Unlike most of his
contemporaries, Balenciaga could do his own cutting, draping and sewing, from start to finish. The show unfolds by thematic threads that show how Balenciaga expressed himself through structured and abstract volumes, luscious draping, textures, transparency and contrasting embellishment. As the title implies, all of the pieces (save for one ill-placed bronzy gown) is black. That focus allows even fashion-challenged viewers to appreciate the sculptural qualities the designs, as well as the soulfulness inherent in Balenciaga’s work, much of which was inspired by the traditions of his native country. While he worked some of his best magic with folds of taffeta, creating waves of reflected and absorbed light, he was also a wizard of lace — the fabric of Spanish mantillas — which he gathered, crumpled and layered like nobody’s business. In Spain, black is a matter of life and death: An elegant, celebratory color when it is shiny; the palette of mourning when it is matte. Balenciaga probed those dualities with myriad types of fabric, from opaque crepes to delicate laces to shimmering paillettes or soft-glowing satin. Some of his ideas demanded custom fabric; the Swiss textile firm Abraham created gazar and zagar to provide a stronger structure for some of his most inventive designs. At the Palais Galliera, where “Balenciaga in Black” originated, the display was incorporated more dramatically into rooms of classical sculpture and paintings. The Kimbell’s straightforward presentation feels almost too austere, and the combination of dim lighting and reflective glass cases makes some of the garments hard to see. The Fort Worth exhibition, however, pairs Balenciaga The companion with show a more “Goya than in ample Black accessory. and White” features famous prints and drawings by a Spanish master of an earlier era. With Balenciaga’s ruffles and drapes still fresh in the brain, one might even see the stark scenes of Goya’s social commentary in an entirely new light.