Exhibition looks at magic of fashion’s most fetishized item
MoMu’s new show takes visitors on a journey through the history of fine footwear, with plenty pop-cultural references and historical side notes
Let the shoes do the talking
From comfy trainers to impossibly high heels, shoes tell the story of their wearer, and they often become cultural icons in their own right. Just think of the glass slipper that helped Cinderella find her prince or the $500 Manolo Blahniks that symbolised independence for Sex and the City’s Carrie Bradshaw.
And if those seem like slightly shallow examples, take the shoe museum in East Flanders. It has an entire section devoted to artists who sent in the shoes they wear while working.
Given their popularity and the role they have played in the history of fashion, Antwerp’s MoMu thought it was high time to put the shoe on a pedestal. “Shoes are attractive to people of all ages,” says Karen Van Godtsenhoven, co-curator of Footprint: The Tracks of Shoes in Fashion. “They are objects of beauty and eroticism, but at the same time, they serve historical and cultural roles.”
The height of a heel or platform has been linked to social status for hundreds of years, Van Godtsenhoven explains. “The higher the shoe, the less you had to walk, which to an extent is still true today,” she says. “Shoes can point to rebellion, like the Dr Martens boots worn by skinheads and punks, or to oppression. The Chinese lotus shoes are the most extreme example of the latter.”
The new exhibition at Antwerp's fashion museum MoMu, which comes on the heels of their successful Dries Van Noten retrospective, wishes to highlight all these aspects of fashion’s most fetishized item, while steering clear of theoretical exposés.
“We did not want to present a historical overview,” Van Godtsenhoven says. “We are a contemporary fashion museum, so the focus is on 20th-century footwear, with an occasional nod to the past. We let the shoes do the talking.”
Gucci for the masses
The museum has opted for its signature thematic approach. Visitors will find two dozen displays that connect shoes to such notions as surrealism, architecture, pop music, dance, folklore and – of course – fetish.
“Sometimes a designer gets his or her own theme,” Van Godtsenhoven adds. “The Italian Salvatore Ferragamo, for instance, who changed shoe design both technically and aesthetically in the middle of the 20th century. He was Marilyn Monroe’s personal favourite. Or Dirk Bikkembergs, a member of the Antwerp Six, who invented the luxury sneaker with his casual chic football shoes.”
Teenagers who visit the museum only know houses such as Dior or Lanvin because of Kanye West
Highlights in the collection include heels worn by celebrities – Marilyn but also Amy Winehouse – and particularly iconic pairs, like the insanely high mock-crocodile platforms by Vivienne Westwood in which a young Naomi Campbell took a tumble on the catwalk in 1993.
There are stilettos co-designed by Christian Louboutin and film director David Lynch as well as look-alikes that date back to the 1900s and prove that the Frenchman did not invent the famous red sole.
Footprint brings together more than 500 shoes, some 100 of which belong to the museum’s collection thanks to a long-term loan from Geert Bruloot (the exhibition’s other curator) and Eddy Michiels. As the founders of Coccodrillo, Antwerp’s designer-shoe heaven, Bruloot and Michiels have been collecting spectacular footwear since 1984.
Season after season, the two bought the hottest designs of the moment. The most unusual pairs proved hard to sell but were perfect for creating eccentric window displays. Later, they ended up as objets d’art in the shoe lovers’ collection.
The golden days
While designer shoes were once the prerogative of the elite, these days they have mass appeal. As fewer and fewer people are able to afford €5,000 dresses, more and more start splurging on €500 heels, a tendency both welcomed and lamented by Bruloot.
As a salesman, he depends on the average woman and man in the street who dream of a pair of Prada slippers or Gucci loafers to call their own. But as a collector, he fondly recalls a time in which shoes were experimental and exciting instead of just a means for labels to make money.
Van Godtsenhoven feels the same way about the impact of celebrity culture on fashion. But at the same time, she realises its value. “Some teenagers who visit the museum only know houses such as Dior or Lanvin because Kanye West wears their sneakers,” she says. “You can cry over this, but without the likes of West, young people wouldn’t know the brands at all.”
It’s only fitting, then, that the exhibition includes West’s designs for Giuseppe Zanotti as well as a pair of his Yeezy trainers, limited-editions made in collaboration with Adidas. They inspired overnight campouts in front of stores and sold out instantly.
These kinds of well-placed pop-cultural references and historical side notes are what make Footprint an interesting style overview rather than a shallow shoe parade. Still, this colourful carnival is fantastic fun even if you’re unable to spot these winks.
Did I say shoes are like salt? I meant more like candy. For grown-ups.
Until 14 February at MoMu, Nationalestraat 28, Antwerp
Photo by Koen de Waal / MoMu
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