"Issey Miyake Making Things," Miyake's current offering, presents the master in three different aspects. Broadly speaking, of course, sculpture, painting and fashion design are related, but no one else has such ability to convince us that these three arts can be made one.
The exhibition, which debuted at the Fondation Cartier pour l'Art Contemporain in Paris in 1998 and moved on to the Ace Gallery in New York a year later, arrives in Japan as the first public presentation in Japan in 2000 by Miyake, arguably Asia's most influential designer.
The emphasis, naturally, is heavily on Miyake as designer. It is we who become the "clothes makers," for Miyake holds that a square of textile is only a piece of cloth; the wearer brings it to life and adds the final details.