Recent Programming for "Fast Fashion/Slow Art," Spring 2020
The opening of Fast Fashion/Slow Art on January 30 attracted many students, faculty, and members of the Brunswick community. Before the BCMA’s closure, various public programs related to the exhibition occurred. As the exhibition will be on view until August 2, we hope to realize other programs later this summer. The following is a recap of notable events:
A panel with Bibiana Obler and Phyllis Rosenzweig, exhibition co-curators, kickstarted the show’s programming on January 30. Anne Collins Goodyear, museum co-director, Allison Martino, postdoctoral curatorial fellow, and Horace Wang, student curatorial assistant, spoke with Obler and Rosenzweig about the curators’ exposure to fast fashion, the intersectional nature of fast fashion, and the role of film as a medium for addressing the fashion and garment industry.
On February 20, the BCMA partnered with Bowdoin’s Sustainability Office to host a Sustainable Knitting Night for students inside the exhibition. Students who came to the Museum knit an object of their choosing or sewed a cozy for a mason jar using materials recycled from thrift shops. Several of the participants noted that this was their first time knitting or sewing.
The BCMA also organized several events with individuals whose work is included in the exhibition. Cat Mazza, associate professor of art at the University of Massachusetts-Boston, visited on February 28 with members of the Lattice20 Collective. This group is made up of UMass-Boston students Nia Duong, Maria Gonzalez, Remy Hunter, and Erica Imosi, all of whom assisted last year with the creation of Mazza’s Electroknit Dymaxion. Mazza and the students spoke about the work and then led participants in a sewing workshop.
Later this summer, we hope to welcome to campus Otto von Busch, associate professor of integrated design at the Parsons School of Design. His lecture entitled “Fashion, Allure, Labor” was originally scheduled for April 6, but we hope to find an alternate date shortly. Von Busch will speak about the “paradoxes” of fashion, including the perception that what we wear is unique when it is actually chosen by the fashion industry, and will address the role that consumers play in promoting and advertising clothing.
These and other programs seek to expand the dialogue about the significance of the fast fashion industry and the ways that artists contribute to that conversation. We hope that you will participate as soon as the BCMA re-opens.
Horace Wang ’20, Student Curatorial Assistant
Bowdoin College Museum of Art