Muslim Fashion

The fashion show at the de Young was sensational! And there was also a Gauguin show!

Both collections were so well done and both were filled with new information for me. My art studies let me know that Gauguin was self taught but I either never knew or simply did not recall that he went back and forth between France and the French colonies often staying a year or so in the more exotic, or what he wrote were more simple spiritual places. In my mind he moved from Paris to Tahiti, period… Instead he left Paris as a failed stock broker with a wife and 5 children to move to her parents home in Denmark. He was a Sunday painter all the time prior to his move. His family remained in Denmark with his wife acting as his dealer to support the children. The paintings from this early period are nothing like the ones I studied in Art History.

The painting above is what I think of as Gauguin in Tahiti, actually it was painted in Paris after his return there. The lower one was painted in countryside of Denmark before he left for good.

The Muslim Fashion show was just plain wonderful. Gorgeous design. Sumptuous fabrics. Extraordinary shapes.

Statements about women’s place in the Muslin world by women, their status and the wide choices some women can make, especially those of great wealth.

And there were women in the arts challenging the stereotypes too.

And then lunch … Lunch at the de Young seems to always begin with a line. The staff I spoke with said that it is all about tables. The first folks have no line and the all the tables fill up, even the ones in the patio (covered with plastic now). Then there is a line. But as usual the food was pretty good.