Dirk Van Saene, ‘I Feel Perfectly Terrible’, 2021

Dirk Van Saene is one of the Antwerp Six, a group of designers who graduated in the 1980s from the Antwerp Academy fashion department and together made their international breakthrough. He does not follow trends and will not allow himself to be pigeonholed. He also refuses to be dictated by the fashion industry. He designs his collections at his own pace and produces his pieces in collaboration with small, independent Italian and Belgian studios. An eye for excellent craftsmanship is key to understanding his work.

Dirk Van Saene is also active in the artworld. This sculpture is the perfect opening to the exhibition as it embodies the exhibition’s main themes: psychology, emotion, human replicas, and the dressed body. It also demonstrates how Van Saene likes to explore the twilight zone between art and fashion. Fashion comes with certain restrictions, but in art he can create freely: it does not need to be wearable, nor does it need to accommodate a moving body . His figures are neither mannequins nor traditional sculptures, they are characters dressed by him in custom garments and comment on both the tragedy and humour of what it means to be alive.