Fashion Sense? exhibition in partnership with Ulster Museum launches online

As part of the Courtauld National Partners programme, The Courtauld is working with secondary schools and colleges around the UK – in locations including Ashton-under-Lyne, Belfast, Braintree, Coventry, Flintshire, Hull, Preston and Wolverhampton – to share exciting learning opportunities for young people through an art history approach.

The latest project – Fashion Sense? – was developed to run alongside The Courtauld’s recent Renoir and the New Era partner exhibition at Ulster Museum, and specifically draws upon the key themes of fashion, culture and the gaze in Renoir’s famous painting La Loge (1874) in The Courtauld’s collection.

The project aims to encourage secondary students to use art history approaches to bring a 21st century interpretation to the painting that is personal to them. Using the new Fashion Sense? project sourcebook, teachers and students can work through a number of activities as a starting point to create a cover and double page spread of a zine that makes a comment on contemporary fashion and identity.

Working online and remotely this year due to the coronavirus pandemic presented new opportunities for The Courtauld to develop and deliver the project around a brief that students could respond to virtually, specifically allowing for personal responses and the time to develop their work independently. The resulting Fashion Sense? Student Exhibition is a platform to showcase the students’ work and voices, and The Courtauld is delighted to share their contemporary interpretations of this important painting.

Alice Hellard, Heritage and Learning Officer at The Courtauld, said: “We have been so impressed with the quality of submissions and the enthusiasm for the project from all of the students and teachers involved. Their zines demonstrate the relevance of works such as La Loge to contemporary fashion and culture, and the zine format is a brilliant way to illustrate this.”

The exhibition can be viewed on The Courtauld’s website and includes a short film by Dr Karen Serres, Curator of Paintings at The Courtauld. The Fashion Sense? sourcebook is also available to download on our website. If you are interested in finding out more or would like our support in running the project in your school or college contact education@courtauld.ac.uk

The Courtauld National Partners programme is supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.