An installation conceived by the artist Shakuntala Kulkarni for Dior's autumn-winter ready-to-wear collection. Entertainment 2024-2025 created by Maria Grazia Chiuri.
Born in 1950 in Karnataka, Shakuntala Kulkarni is an Indian artist living in Mumbai. Her work explores the relationship between the female body and public and private urban spaces. This body has often been represented and perceived as stripped of strength, in the sense of physical, muscular strength, the primacy of which has been given to men. Inserted in the heart of the city, the body cannot be neutral, as it is interconnected with material, symbolic and sociological definitions. It is always placed in situ, occupying its position and location in the world, and therefore represents the primary means of a political relationship, to the extent that it restores subjectivity to its being exposed, gendered and plural in dimension. The female body, outside the domestic sphere, becomes a social construction. In her series "of bodies, armor and cages", Shakuntala Kulkarni uses the cane, a flexible and elastic medium, to design armor: sculpted and performing elements that dress, protect and transform the body, but at the same time imprison it in a sort of cage with a seductive and at the same time uncomfortable aesthetic.
The cane frames are the result of an experimentation started in 2010 with the help of specialized craftsmen working with this material
They are modeled on the measurements of the artist's body, which each of them can wear and inhabit. His first photographic performance was about protecting his city, Mumbai, by wearing his armour, in the places where he had spent his childhood, places he frequented with his family and for work, where a certain kind of community life and culture was disappearing. Her presence, immobile in these same places, symbolically expressed her role as protector of traditions, history and culture. Her gesture came from a specific geographical area, India, but is potentially transposable to all environments and cultures. In her live performances, Shakuntala Kulkarni borrows complex choreographies from theater and forms of dance and yoga from India, in which strength, balance and grace interpenetrate. The movements spread courage, resilience, generosity and dignity. The armor depicts the fusion of various cultural influences and features an entire body language of iconic mythological and historical figures. In 2016, Shakuntala Kulkarni produced a video titled Juloos, in which she plays the lead role of her, evolving as a female warrior, wearing a helmet and other staff elements. In her installation for the Dior autumn-winter 2024-2025 ready-to-wear fashion show designed by Maria Grazia Chiuri, at the Tuileries Gardens, the artist reveals, alongside her sculptures, several extracts from this film. Printed on canvas, they integrate the elements of the scenography to give the whole a performative essence. The rediscovery of the fighting strength that a woman's body can embody is a key point of the personal journey, political and cultural journey of feminist liberation, a prevalent news topic in many parts of the world. This piece questions female subjectivity, not only from the point of view of the body and its social and political vulnerability, but above all from her power in relation to the urban space and the social system in which she operates and which we evolve.
For the autumn-winter 2024-2025 ready-to-wear fashion show by Dior, Maria Grazia Chiuri reflected on the era di transition of the late 60s, when fashion left the ateliers to conquer the world.
The collection celebrates the shapes and materials that, when the Miss Dior boutique opened in Paris, gave impetus towards a new way of dressing that can unite numerous women and make them all special. The scarf, dear to Maria Grazia Chiuri, is once again the must-have accessory. In everyday life, at work or while travelling, the scarf is adjustable and compact, protective, enveloping and embellished according to needs. Free and fluid silhouettes, like those of the A line, facilitate movement towards new horizons, enhancing the woman's body without compressing it. The colors take up the Marc Bohan range: white, orange, pink, neon green, with tones adapted to the make-up. Selected pieces are in double cashmere, but also in gabardine, including dresses, trousers, coats, jackets and skirts cut above the knee. The Miss Dior logo is represented as a signature poster in a palette of blues, reds and browns. The studs are replaced by beads and the embroidery has a bold impact. The models move in a scenario created by the Indian artist Shakuntala Kulkarni, who explores the female body and its relationship with different spaces. The looks convey the radiant strength of a pluralistic, autonomous reality and a versatile femininity, reactivating that key moment of creative freedom of which Miss Dior is the emblem.
