March 6, 2019: The Costume Institute Benefit – The Met Gala – will precede The Costume Institute's spring 2019 exhibition, Camp: Notes on Fashion, which will explore how fashion evolved from a place of marginality to become an important influence on mainstream culture. Susan Sontag's 1964 essay "Notes on 'Camp'" provides the framework for the exhibition, which 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.
"Camp's disruptive nature and subversion of modern aesthetic values has often been trivialized, but this exhibition will reveal that it has had a 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 that this important genre has played in the history of art and fashion."
In celebration of the opening, The Costume Institute Benefit will take place on Monday, May 6. The evening's co-chairs will be 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.
The exhibition will feature approximately 200 objects, including womenswear and menswear, as well as sculptures, paintings, and drawings dating from the 17th century to the present. Designers whose works will be featured in the exhibition include Virgil Abloh (for Off-White), Giorgio Armani, Manish Arora, Christopher Bailey (for Burberry), Cristóbal Balenciaga, Thom Browne, Sarah Burton (for Alexander McQueen), Gabrielle Chanel, Jean-Charles de Castelbajac, Christian Dior, John Galliano (for Maison Margiela, House of Dior, and his own label), Jean Paul Gaultier, Nicolas Ghesquière (for Louis Vuitton), Silvia Venturini Fendi (for Fendi), Donatella Versace (for Versace), Vivienne Westwood and many more.