Antwerp Fashion Graduates
The Royal Academy of the Fine Arts Antwerp Fashion Department’s showed off its students’ end-of-year and graduate collections through a streamed show for the second year. Acknowledged as one of the top fashion schools in the world, the fashion department is led by Walter Van Beirendonck.
The collection and video presentations of the 20 graduating Masters, supervised by Dirk Van Saene in collaboration with director and cinematographer Bjorn Tagemose, were filmed with drones on the rooftops of Antwerp and a catwalk inside the newly renovated Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten by KAAN Architecten.
Maestra by Jasmin Bandomer
Skim the clouds atop the wind by Angelika Öllinger
Premium Vitamin D Couture by Ania Yelizar
Harvest by Priss Niinikoski
You are the most beautiful fate by Mohammed El Marnissi
X-Trasy by Ezio Costa
Why aren’t boots called italies? by Giorgia Galfre
Turn back by Liu Zexian
The future is black by Marc pengel
Why this matters
We follow the show of the Antwerp graduates every year and compared to last year the collections were more fragmented, cut up, combined like glitches and memories. The materials were more decorated and embellished in new ways, with feathers, ribbons and embroideries but also digitally printed with computer-animated prints with movement and light effects. Layering and volume were important, the use of colour was softer and more optimistic.
The way they present the collections is of a high standard, using the latest technology, the graduates are given a platform to present their collections to the world. The presentations were only visual, with no writing behind the thought process or the concept, or title. Because of climate change and fashion’s role in it, the why behind a collection is important. A visual delight is a joy but lacks depth and meaning without words.