Discover the incredible World of Wearable Art

By MiNDFOOD

Photo credit: Stephen AíCourt.
Photo credit: Stephen AíCourt.

Designers from eight countries have won awards at the prestigious World of WearableArt Awards in Wellington, New Zealand. And, MiNDFOOD has all the pictures.

New Zealand’s largest theatrical performance, World of WearableArt (WOW) is celebrating its 30th anniversary season in 2018. WOW combines the world’s leading wearable art design competition with a spectacular stage show that attracts an annual audience of around 60,000 people – over 40,000 of those travelling to the capital city from across New Zealand and around the globe.

The 2018 show featured 140 finalist garments of Wearable Art by 147 designers from 17 countries and regions, vying for 39 awards.

This year’s Supreme WOW Award winner was WAR sTOrY by Natasha English and Tatyanna Meharry of Christchurch, New Zealand. The sisters are the first ever two-time Supreme WOW Award Winners, having taken the top award in 2013 for ‘The Exchange’. This year’s Supreme garment commemorates the more than 128,000 New Zealand men and women who served in World War I, of which more than 18,000 never returned home.

Photo credit: Stephen AíCourt.

It was created using recycled objects such as old army and household blankets, salvaged rimu from demolished houses, old collected plastic toy soldiers, broken crushed red bricks and traded pieces of pounamu to create the garment.

WOW Founder and Head Judge Dame Suzie Moncrieff says WAR sTOrY is “a garment that the judges described as an exceptional example of powerful storytelling realised through a work of art. An entry that the judges described as an exceptionally compelling realisation of a thought-provoking narrative that is flawless in its execution.”

This year’s show is presented as a series of six worlds, each with its own design provocation that designers have responded to. Along with the recurring Avant-garde, Aotearoa and Open sections are Under the Microscope, Reflective Surfaces and the biennial Bizarre Bra.

WOW’s 2018 judging panel consisted of WOW Founder Dame Suzie Moncrieff; Margarita Robertson, Creative Director of iconic fashion label NOM*d; Sam Gao, Weta Workshop Art Director and Business Development Manager; Weta Workshop Co-founder and CEO Sir Richard Taylor; Cirque du Soleil’s Nathalie Bouchard and International Guest judge Mary Wing To.

Garments go through a three-stage judging process to end up onstage, beginning in July. The garments are assessed for detail as well as their performance on stage.

Other notable winners include:

Echoplex – Goddess of Reverb by Natalie Hutton (Melbourne, Australia) Winner: Avant-garde Section:

Photo credit: Stephen AíCourt.

The sonic shapes and textures Natalie†Hutton†(Melbourne, Australia) sees and feels when listening to music provided the inspiration for her garment Echoplex – Goddess of Reverb. She says it’s a combination of “the sharp lines and soft curves that grip, ripple, reflect and repeat off the planes of the body and flow onto the ground like goosebumps down your spine and arms when listening to that perfect song.” More than 50 metres of silk were meticulously hand stitched into a honeycomb grid before being sculpted into its final form. Hutton says it took more than 360 hours to create the garment which she started thinking about in 2010 while listening to music on the train, beginning the physical construction in 2016. Hutton is a first-time designer for World of WearableArt.

Ernst Haeckel’s Bride by Nika Danielska, Wroclaw, Poland. Runner Up: Supreme WOW Award and Winner: Under the Microscope Section:

Photo credit: Stephen AíCourt.

Mind the Synaptic Gap by Grace DuVal, Chicago, United States. Winner: Dame Suzie Award:

Photo credit: Stephen AíCourt.

World of WearableArt is on at TSB Arena, Wellington from September 27 until October 14.

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