The History of Clothing (April 20)
Description
Human beings create second, social, skins for themselves. Everyone designs interfaces between their bodies and the world around them. From prehistoric ornaments to global industry, clothing has always been a crucial feature of people’s survival, desires, and identity. This session studies theories of clothing from the perspectives of anthropology, architecture, art history, craft, economics, labor, law, psychology, semiotics, sociology, and sustainability. Some of the issues for discussion include gender roles, craft traditions, global textile trade, royal sumptuary law, the history of European fashion, dissident or disruptive styles, and the environmental consequences of what we wear today. (Offered in the morning and afternoon on April 20.)
About the Faculty Lead
Dr. Anne Higonnet graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Harvard College in 1980. Since her PhD thesis on the Impressionist Berthe Morisot, she has worked to expand the field of art history. She has authored 5 print books, edited two book-scale online sites, and published many essays on a wide variety of cultural topics. A book about the clothing part of the French Revolution, Liberty, Equality, Fashion, is in production at Norton & Co., scheduled for publication in 2024.
Among her projects have been the visual components of two volumes in the pioneering 1992-95 The History of Women, published world-wide, and participation on the advisory board and in the catalogue of the national French Musée d’Orsay’s Le Modèle Noir, a 2019 exhibition hailed by the European press and called in Artforum “one of the most consequential events to take place in the field of nineteenth-century art in Euro-America in recent decades.” B.A. Harvard College, Ph.D. Yale University
Registration is Open Now!
Barnard alums (and individuals they invite) and families of current Barnard students can now register for the Spring 2024 Explorers Series — the inaugural Barnard|Next classes. Questions about participation can be addressed to barnardnext@barnard.edu.