BELLOIR, Véronique, Helena López de HIERRO, Gaspard de MASSÉ and Olivier SAILLARD (2022), Balenciaga: Meesterlijk Zwart, Zwolle: Waanders Uitgevers, Kunstmuseum Den Haag. ISBN978-94-6262-427-6. Hardback, 195 pp., fully illustrated in black/white and colour; short bibliography, no index. Price: €29.95.
A fully illustrated catalogue to an exhibition about the Spanish fashion designer, Cristobel Balenciaga Eizaguirre (1895-1972), which was held at the Kunstmuseum in The Hague (the Netherlands), between 24th September 2022 and 5th March 2023.
Balenciaga, as he was generally known, started active life as a fashion designer in the 1920s and 1930s with houses in San Sabastian and later in Madrid and Barcelona. In 1936 and the start of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939), he moved to Paris and in 1937 opened his own fashion house and became a well-known personality of the Parisian fashion industry, especially in the 1950s and 1960s. He closed the firm in 1968 and retired. The company was later revived and continues to be active to the present day in Paris and elsewhere.
The fashion designs of Balenciaga are regarded as being concise and sculptural, and engineered in some cases in order to gain the effect he wanted: the human body as an instrument for art. He produced a wide range of designs in many different colours, but he was fascinated by the use of black. He combined, for example, shiny black materials with matt forms to create different visual effects. The range of black garments is fascinating.
Recommendation: This is an art book, in black with white letters (sometimes black letters), which can make it difficult to read the texts, and in the case of photographs of black garments on a black ground it can make it very difficult to understand what is actually being portrayed. Nevertheless, as a history of Balenciaga’s designs and developments it is a very interesting book. Worthwhile having if you are seriously interested in the development of 20th and early 21st century fashion and haute couture designs.
Gillian Vogelsang-Eastwood, 1 January 2023
