A Couple Dressed in the Height of Fashion 1744

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.