Produced and curated by Barrett Barrera Projects, “Ann Ray & Lee McQueen: Rendez-Vous” explores the 13-year friendship and intimate creative collaboration between the late British designer Lee Alexander McQueen and French photographer Ann Ray (otherwise known as Anne Deniau), whom McQueen personally selected to document his design process and the behind-the-scenes experience of his runway shows.
The exhibition, which reopens on Thursday, July 23, at projects+exhibitions (4568 Manchester Ave. in St. Louis), features photographs taken by Ray, reflecting her unique relationship with McQueen between the years of 1997 and 2010, alongside garments McQueen gifted to her over the course of their work together. The exhibition also features more than two dozen spectacular McQueen pieces from Barrett Barrera Projects’ collection, the largest private collection of McQueen’s work.
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In conjunction with the reopening of “Ann Ray & Lee McQueen: Rendez-Vous,” a new exhibition titled “Introducing Lee Alexander McQueen” debuts on Thursday, July 23, at Barrett Barrera Projects (4739 McPherson Ave. in St. Louis). Along with garments that span McQueen’s entire career, the exhibition features hand-drawn garment sketches and patterns (1995-96), as well as invitations, programs and other ephemera from his early runway shows – including “The Hunger,” “Bellmer La Poupée” and “Dante.” On the whole, “Introducing Lee Alexander McQueen” explores the designer’s ability to blend exquisite craftsmanship with intimate and imaginative storytelling, taking the viewer along on the journey from the naissance of a design concept to the final stitch.
Lee Alexander McQueen is a British fashion designer who founded the iconic, eponymous label and served as chief designer of Givenchy from 1996 to 2001. McQueen was known for designing outside the conventions of the fashion world, often taking inspiration from avant-garde installations, theatre, performance art and gothic fairytales. The immersive experience of his runway shows allowed fashion to transcend commodification. McQueen saw fashion as an artistic medium—one capable of evoking the sublime and providing commentary on identity, culture, values and politics. His work has been shown at The Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Victoria and Albert Museum in the solo exhibition, “Savage Beauty.”
Ann Ray is a French visual artist. She is self-taught in photography, except for alternative processes, which she learned during her studies at Central Saint Martins in London. During the late ‘90s, she lived in Tokyo and London, where she forged an unbreakable relationship with Lee Alexander McQueen, whom she immediately recognized as a pure artist. This was the start of an intense friendship and artistic collaboration that was as prolific as it was unique. From 1997 until the designer’s tragic end in 2010, Ann Ray’s caring gaze captured the spirit of the man and the essence of his work in many intimate situations: portrait sessions, at work in the studio, during performances – images of truth that reveal McQueen’s creativity. Ray first revealed part of her work with McQueen to the public during the exhibition, “Les Inachevés: Lee McQueen,” at the 2018 edition of the Rencontres d’Arles. In 2019, she presented the exhibition “Blind Faith,” at Ca’Pesaro in Venice, showing a series of portraits she took of different artists with their eyes closed. She is currently working on a creative documentary, a feature film, and she is preparing the publication of a collection of poems and images, as well as her first novel.
Click here for a preview of “Ann Ray & Lee McQueen: Rendez-Vous.”
For additional details regarding Barrett Barrera Projects’ COVID-19 guidelines, click here. Or visit barrettbarrera.com.
Content provided by Barrett Barrera Projects
Acclaimed Designer McQueen Lives On in Two Barrett Barrera Projects Exhibits
