A Couple Dressed in the Height of Fashion by Joseph Highmore

A Couple Dressed in the Height of Fashion 1744

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Dimensions: support: 202 x 266 mm

Copyright: CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 DEED, Photo: Tate

Curator: Here we have Joseph Highmore's "A Couple Dressed in the Height of Fashion," held in the Tate Collections. Editor: Oh, my! They look like they're about to float away! Is that a cloud or her enormous skirt? Curator: It's the skirt! Highmore captures the almost absurd theatricality of 18th-century fashion, reflecting a society obsessed with outward appearances. Editor: Right! It's all about the presentation, the performance. The fan, the sword...they are tools of a social game. Curator: Precisely. Highmore uses these visual cues to explore themes of status, gender, and the performance of identity. Editor: Makes me wonder, what stories are hidden behind all that fabric and those carefully posed gestures? Curator: It makes me think about the universal human desire to project an image, a version of ourselves, to the world. Editor: Well, I think I’m ready to go try on a wig and practice my fan gestures.

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tate about 1 month ago

http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/highmore-a-couple-dressed-in-the-height-of-fashion-t04238

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