Good news fashionistas! The Met Gala is coming back!
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Monday, The Metropolitan Museum of Art announced that the annual high fashion extravaganza which was canceled in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic, will finally be returning for a “more intimate” affair in September of this year. It will resume its usual larger-than-life Springtime offering in May of 2022.
While there is no word on who the celebrity hosts, or chairs, will be for the two galas, Queen & Slim filmmaker Melina Matsoukas has been commissioned to create an open-ended film to be projected in the galleries, with content that will change throughout the course of the exhibition.
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Opening Sept. 18 “In America: A Lexicon of Fashion,” will celebrate the 75th anniversary of the museum’s Costume Institute and “explore a modern vocabulary of American fashion,” the museum said. Their second offering, “In America: An Anthology of Fashion,” will open on May 5, 2022.
“Fashion is both a harbinger of cultural shifts and a record of the forces, beliefs, and events that shape our lives,” said Max Hollein, director of the Met, in a statement. “This two-part exhibition will consider how fashion reflects evolving notions of identity in America and will explore a multitude of perspectives through presentations that speak to some of the complexities of history with powerful immediacy.”
“Over the past year, because of the pandemic, the connections to our homes have become more emotional, as have those to our clothes,” Met curator Andrew Bolton said in his own statement. “For American fashion, this has meant an increased emphasis on sentiment over practicality.”
THR notes that in addition to Matsoukas, other confirmed film collaborators include, cinematographer Bradford Young, production designers Nathan Crowley and Shane Valentino; and film executive Franklin Leonard who is also the founder of The Black List.
The world is her oyster
Working on a film for one of the most important nights in high fashion is just the latest accomplishment for Matsoukas, whose star has been on the rise for quite some time now.
As we previously reported at the beginning of the year, through her production company De La Revolución Films — the widely celebrated director has signed a two-year, first-look film production deal with MGM.
In addition to directing and executive producing HBO’s Insecure, Matsoukas is best known for helming music videos for artists such as Rihanna, Lady Gaga, Snoop Dogg, Alicia Keys, and Beyoncé. She is the mastermind behind the visuals for the singer’s “Formation” single, which won the 2017 Grammy for Best Music Video.
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“After over a decade of collaborating with Melina we’ve become family,” she said in 2009. “In 2005, she managed to shoot five videos with me in three days, creating beautiful imagery with little to no budget. We’ve come a long ways since those days.”
The superstar added, “[Melina] is holding up a mirror for people who look like you and me to see ourselves, saying, ‘You are beautiful, and your stories matter.'”
Bey continued, “Her drive, vision, taste level, and storytelling is boldly unapologetic.”
Matsoukas’ MGM deal reunites her with Pamela Abdy, MGM Film Group President, who collaborated with the award-winning producer on her directorial debut Queen & Slim. The 2019 crime drama was penned by Emmy winner Lena Waithe and starred Daniel Kaluuya and Jodie Turner-Smith. The project was nominated for a DGA Award for First-Time Feature Film and earned Matsoukas the Franklin J. Schaffner Alumni Medal from the AFI.
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