Season by season, Iris van Herpen refines her aesthetic and expands the scope and complexity of her collaborations. For Spring 2013 Couture, she also added theatrics to her bag of tricks. Voltage opened with an incredible performance by Carlos Van Camp, an artist known for his experiments with the Tesla coil. Standing atop this contraption, Van Camp, dressed in a specially designed IVH costume, became a conductor of electricity; towering above the audience in the darkened show space, he emitted bolts of lightning from his body.
Van Herpen discovered the New Zealander while “doing research into technical aspects of electricity and how we use it in our daily lives,” she told Victoria and Albert Museum curator Leanne Wierzba. “I think there is an interesting relationship between clothes and the human body,” she continued, “in that wearing different clothing can definitely create some form of energy. It is psychological and very strong. I used to dance a lot, so movement, energy, its transformation within the body, and how you can control this has always been very fascinating for me. With Voltage, I dived into that subject directly.”
This body focus led to the creation of one of Van Herpen’s most successful collections, perhaps because it was so personal, with roots extending to the designer’s childhood, when she dreamed of being able to make lightning tangible. Having been inspired by the work of Philip Beesley for her previous collection, Van Herpen was able to realize a material collaboration with him for Voltage; the architect contacted her after he’d seen Hybrid Holism.
Van Herpen’s exquisite, otherworldly designs were presented in the most homely set she’s used to date. The models walked an elaborately patterned and carpeted runway, and it wasn’t only the setting that was softer—the technology was, too. For the first time, Van Herpen, working with the Mediated Matter group from MIT, was able to 3-D print a flexible material. “The ability to vary softness and elasticity inspired us,” said architect Neri Oxman, “to design a ‘second skin’ for the body acting as armor-in-motion. In this way we were able to design not only the garment’s form but also its motion.” That’s what we call moving on up.
