Tae Smith – Creating the Ideal: Dressing and Installing Costume Exhibitions

There are numerous objectives and challenges involved in dressing a costume exhibition. Reconditioning a historic garment forces one to know the object intimately. In this talk, Tae Smith will explore the important role dressing plays in the conservation of historic garments and in the presentation of an exhibition's narrative. She also will address the varying philosophies and approaches to garments as museum objects. A mannequin preparation and garment-dressing demonstration will follow. Tae Smith is a costume and textile expert who specializes in dressing and exhibiting costumes and textiles. She has worked for the Costume Institute of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Bard Graduate Center, and the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, among others. Presented in conjunction with the exhibition Fashioning the Body: An Intimate History of the Silhouette (http://www.bgc.bard.edu/gallery/gallery-at-bgc/fashioning-the-body.html) at Bard Graduate Center Gallery.