Jeff Horsley Speaks on COMME des GARÇONS' Extensive Campaign Archive

Having recently opened RED Comme des Garçons: innovation, provocation at East London’s Live Archives, the exhibition has been curated by Jeff Horsley as a testament to the brand’s pioneering contribution and the “radical spirit of Japanese fashion.” Showing pieces from 1994 to 2012, the show exhibits how Rei Kawakubo continually directed the brand to the forefront of contemporary fashion through experimentation and provocation.

The show has been inspired by the 2001 Comme des Garçons presentation at Walter Van Beirendonk’s Antwerp fashion festival Mode2001, where Kawakubo famously offered five “statements” and covered all lighting in a red gel so that every garment would appear as a shade of red or black. Horsley states that “this was an incredible thing for a designer to do to her work. Colour is such an important aspect of design, so obliterating it was quite an extraordinary step to take.” RED has since appropriated this technique and has removed all natural-colored light with the intention of being both reminiscent and evocative. Head on over to AnOther to read their recent interview with Jeff Horsley and discover what he has done to further realize such a significant point in the company’s history.