When the Clothes Make the Art

Shakespeare wrote that "the apparel oft proclaims the man," but he forgot to mention that it often proclaims the artwork, too. Going back to the Renaissance, when sumptuary laws defined which classes were allowed to wear what clothing, portraits have always communicated volumes about their sitters through their clothing (just think of the plunging satin neckline of John Singer Sargent's femme fatale Madame X). In contemporary art, artists continue to use fashion to proclaim a subject's status and personality, but often in ways that push against convention rather than project it.

In this collection, we've gathered together artworks that engage with—and upend—fashion's tremendously broad spectrum of connotations. David Bowie's gender-bending attire in Mick Rock's photo, for instance, gives us a liberated icon of a distant world, while Bert Stern's portrait of a coquettish Marilyn Monroe wearing Jackie Kennedy's wig makes a startling bold allusion to the actress's usurpation of the first lady's role in JFK's bed as well.

Explore this collection to learn more about and collect fashionable art that wears subversion on its sleeve.