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| Walter Steiger."Unicorn Tayss," Spring 2013. |
Recently, I spent the afternoon at the vast, one-of-kind, eye-opening exhibition Killer Heels: The Art of the High-Heeled Shoe. This traveling art show is utterly mesmerizing, sexy, and historically educating all at the same time.
Killer Heels explores fashion’s most provocative accessory. From the high platform chopines of sixteenth-century Italy to the glamorous stilettos gracing today’s runways and red carpets, the exhibition looks at the high-heeled shoe’s rich and varied history and its enduring place in our popular imagination. Deadly sharp stilettos, architecturally inspired wedges and platforms, shoes with fox tails, ruffles, horns, feathers, spikes, horse hooves, even some lined with fur are featured among the more than 160 historical and contemporary heels on loan from designers and from the renowned Brooklyn Museum costume collection, housed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
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| Aperial."Geisha Lines," Fall 2013 |
Designers and design houses represented in the exhibition include Manolo Blahnik, Chanel, Jean Paul Gaultier, Salvatore Ferragamo, Tom Ford, Zaha Hadid, Iris van Herpen, Rem D. Koolhass, Christian Louboutin, Alexander McQueen, Andre Perugia, Prada, Elsa Schiaparelli, Noritaka Tatehana, Vivienne Westwood, and Pietro Yantorny.
The Albuquerque exhibit also includes heels by local designers and artists including Janice Ortiz, Virgil Ortiz, Goldie Garcia, Teri Greeves, and Deana McGuffin, as well as examples of the current Mexican Pointy Boots craze sweeping the United States Southwest and northern Mexico.
“The high heels featured in this exhibition are more than just fashion. They’re history. They’re sculpture. Truly, they are art.”
~ Andrew Connors, Curator of Art at the Albuquerque Museum
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| Christian Louboutin."Metropolis," Fall/Winter 2010-11. |
Presented alongside the objects in the exhibition are six specially commissioned risque and daring short films inspired by high heels. The filmmakers are Ghada Amer and Reza Farkhondeh for “Higher Me”, Zach Gold for “Spike”, Steven Klein for “Untitled”, Nick Knight for “La Douleur Exquise”, Marilyn Minter for “Smash”, and Rashaad Newsome for “Knot”.
The exhibition finishes with two hands-on activites, “Design Your Own High Heeled Shoe” using card stock and crayon markers and “Shoe Story - Tell us the story of your favorite shoes!” using lined 4” x 5” paper and pencils, complete with high-heeled chairs to lounge in. Don’t miss the museum store which has been transformed with every imaginable high heeled accessory: cookie cutters, ice cube molds, door stops, jewelry, books, high heeled shoe bags, and slippers to change into after wearing high heeled shoes!
Killer Heels will hang through August 9th at the Albuquerque Museum located at 2000 Mountain Road NW in Old Town, Albuquerque, NM, (505) 243-7255, www.albuquerquemuseum.org. Museum hours are Tuesday - Sunday, 9am - 5pm. Third Thursday of each month until 8:30pm.
