The twelfth issue of Study turns to curator Olivier Saillard, who has spent the last two decades bending the institutions of fashion to his will and undoing them in equal measure. In 2000, he entered the Musée des Arts Décoratifs as Head of Programming, from 2010 he transformed the Palais Galliera into a cathedral of fashion history and since 2017, he taken over the Alaïa Foundation, where garments speak in dialogue with artists.

He is known for his exhibitions—Yohji Yamamoto, Christian Lacroix, Jeanne Lanvin, Madame Grès, Balenciaga—yet it is in his performances that his singular voice emerges. Moda Povera began in 2018 and is his private stage, an ode to craft and to the fragile elevation of everyday garment into something closer to art.

For this issue, photographer Senta Simond entered his stage. She recorded the twenty-seventh chapters of Moda Povera’s Wedding Dresses Always End Up Single, a performance assembled from secondhand gowns scavenged online and in charity bins. Torn apart, sewn back together, the dresses refuse nostalgia. Photographed in Paris the garments were worn not only by the original performer and long time Saillard collaborator, Axelle Doué, but also by two young models chosen by Simond. New faces that pulled the dresses beyond the performance and toward other possible lives.

What remains on the page is double: a record of Saillard’s gestures but also Simond’s own invention, her images melding into the work like another layer of fabric.

The issue also carries a fashion insert with Simond again behind the camera, in partnership with stylist Charlotte Collet. It is a counterpoint to the main portfolio. If the wedding dresses tremble with ritual and disassembly, the insert is charged with youthful insouciance.

Contributors : Charlotte Collet, Angelo Flaccavento, Olivier Saillard, Senta Simond