Fashion and Surrealism

• author: Richard Martin
• publisher: Rizzoli International/Thames & Hudson
• publication date: 1987
• 240 pages, 300 illustrations (50 in color)
• isbn: 0500275505
• from Publishers Weekly: The intersection of surrealism and fashion dates back to Max Ernst's mechanistic fantasies of mannequins and Rene Magritte's delving into the eroticism of clothes. Fashion designer Elsa Schiaparelli, in collaboration with Salvador Dali, made surrealistic dresses that shocked her clients. Illustrators A. M. Cassandre and Marcel Vertes borrowed surrealist imagery, while fashion trend-setters Yves Saint Laurent and Karl Lagerfeld got into the act. Photographers Cecil Beaton, Horst P. Horst and Andre Kertesz experimented with surrealist techniques, and today, of course, surrealism is everywhere in print and television ads, window displays, rock singer David Byrne's latest costumes. The book is broader in scope than its title suggests. Martin, editor of Arts magazine, brings a heavy-handed, academic approach to what should have been fun, but the study is an eye-opener nonetheless.
• BNET.com: ArtForum: Couture de force - interview with curator Richard Martin
• The New York Times: Richard Martin, 52, Curator of the Costume Institute
• International Herald Tribune: An Appreciation of Richard Martin at the Met
• amazon.com