15
May 2024

The Golden Age of Fashion Illustration

Welcome to The Arts Society Beverley
Wednesday, May 15, 2024 - 10:30
Mercure Hull Grange Park Hotel Grange Park Lane Willerby HU10
Willerby Hull HU10 6ER
Online Event

Discover why the 1920s through to the 1950s is known as the golden age of fashion illustration

Clothing and fashion have been depicted in art since the earliest civilisations yet it was not until the late 19th century that fashion in art became a recognised genre and became an essential promotional marketing tool to a wider audience.

Discover the magnificent pioneering artists, and the generation of fashion illustrators that followed, who documented fashion from the glittering 1920s through to the 1950s and why this period is aptly known as the golden age of fashion illustration.

THE ARTS SOCIETY ACCREDITED LECTURER

Mrs Connie Gray

With a background in fashion and broadcasting, Connie Gray is a specialist in the history of 20th century fashion illustration and its powerful legacy with both the most influential fashion publications internationally and the great couture houses of Paris, London and New York. She is regularly invited to lecture both in the UK and the US and sits on advisory boards at The Courtauld Institute of Art, London and Special Collections at FIT, New York. As a curator and archivist, she works closely with institutions and foundations on acquisitions, conservation and exhibition projects. She has been invited to curate specialist exhibitions including most recently Legends Only at Claridge’s Hotel, London in 2022 and 100 Years of Fashion Illustration at The Society of Illustrators, New York. Other specialist exhibitions have included Cunard’s Transatlantic Fashion Cruise on their flagship ship Queen Mary 2 to celebrate London and New York fashion weeks. As the lead curator for the art gallery Gray M.C.A, she curates the acclaimed exhibition Drawing on Style each year that celebrates the masters of fashion illustration alongside running comprehensive lecture programmes that accompany the exhibitions in London and New York. During the Covid19 pandemic period she wrote and presented a series of on-line masterclasses, talks and short films on the subject of fashion illustration that regularly attracted audiences of over 800 people during each live event.