HERNING.- ”No future” leered the punks in the 1970s, launching an attack against normality and bourgeois niceties. Dark and rebellious garb became an external symbol of the internal aggressions of youth, and over the years such resistance has been reflected in the world of fashion.

On 4 October 2014 HEART – Herning Museum of Contemporary Art presented the museum’s first-ever design exhibition. Clash – Counterculture in Fashion presents groundbreaking designs by major fashion designers, transforming social tension and aggression into aesthetic design creations. Audiences can look forward to works by world-famous designers such as Vivienne Westwood, Alexander McQueen, Maison Martin Margiela, Comme des Garçons, and Hussein Chalayan, all shown side by side with designs by emerging talents from the Danish design schools: VIA University College, TEKO Design + Business, Design School Kolding, and The Royal Academy of Fine Art’s School of Design. The exhibition is part of HEART’s new concept HEARTdesign and is realised with support from the Bikuben Foundation and the ege foundation. Clash – Counterculture in Fashion is curated by fashion scholar Ane Lynge Jorlén and Michael Bank Christoffersen.

The impact of counterculture
Clash focuses on how major designers challenge fashion and create their own versions of the rebellious styles found amongst punk, hip hop, and hippie culture and other countercultural movements. Fashion adopts and incorporates these types of revolt and resistance, and designers such as Vivenne Westwood and Alexander McQueen rebel against the commonplace, pursue their own visions, and take a critical stance on the fashion industry of which they are part. That approach has led to a range of spectacular creations which attack the values and body image of the fashion industry, and Clash offers everything from voluminous, absurd costumes to anarchic punk design. Finally, six talents hand-picked from the Danish design schools will offer their takes on the tendencies and designs that infuse and invigorate present-day resistance and counterculture.

Bodies
The body found in fashion is streamlined and leaves little scope for deviations in the form of voluminous, boundary-less bodies. However, some designers deliberately work up against the narrow body aesthetics of fashion. Names featured here include Comme des Garcons, Walter van Beirendonck, Hussein Chalayan, Viktor & Rolf, Rick Owens, and the artists Jen Davis, Leigh Bowery, and Pyuupiru.

New Masculinity
Ever since the days of the 1960s youth rebellion the norms governing what men look like have gradually become looser. Fashion was previously the exclusive province of women, but designers such as Jean Paul Gaultier, Walter Van Beirendonck, Craig Green, Rad Hourani, and Leigh Bowery show that masculinity can be communicated outside of and up against the traditionally narrow boundaries set for gender.

Activism
A key aspect of contemporary fashion is its movement towards a more ethically correct fashion – a trend that includes slow movement, recycling of materials, and a political and ideological distance to fashion. The theme is explored through the work of designers such as Maison Martin Margiela, Hussein Chalayan, Viktor & Rolf, Katharine Hamnett, and Bettina Bakdal.

Faceless
The face is central for forming and anchoring identity. When the face is covered or veiled, the premise for the formation of identity becomes radically changed. Designers who work with this strategy include Maison Martin Margiela, Berhard Willhelm, Iris van Herpen, Craig Green, and Henrik Vibskov.