Chloé’s Fall Collection Features Fabrics Emblazoned with Artworks by Rita Ackerman
Designer Natacha Ramsay-Levi finds feminine inspiration in the Hungarian painter's sketches
The distinct, unabashedly feminine paintings of Hungarian-born, New York–based artist Rita Ackermann are coveted by art insiders and the fashion world alike. Now admirers can adorn themselves in her aesthetic, thanks to Chloé’s cool, confident, and subtly rebellious fall 2020 collection.
Ackermann, who is represented by Hauser & Wirth, is celebrated for her corporal works that touch on anthropomorphism and femininity, and often feature nymphlike women and allusions to fairy tales. Mirroring the painter’s palette of warm, autumnal colors, the brand’s creative director, Natacha Ramsay-Levi, crafted shirt patches, a shawl, minibags, and coat linings that seamlessly incorporate Ackermann’s artworks from decades past.
A flowing shirt is draped in sketchlike portraits mixed with on-trend puff sleeves and graphic buttons to striking effect. At the showcase in Paris earlier this year, guests received invitations accompanied by a mini-poster of an Ackermann painting. Adding the female creative spirit, sculptor Marion Verboom was tasked with creating towering gilded totems along the runway, while singer Marianne Faithfull recited 19th-century poems in a baritone drawl for the show’s soundtrack. Reflecting new femininity, the collection is a celebration of art and fashion through the eyes of inspiring—and inspired—women.
See looks from the collection below.
A version of this article first appeared in print in our 2020 Summer issue in the section The Artful Life. Subscribe to the magazine.