Image: Gallery 98, Brooklyn
The collaboration was notable because Issey Miyake allowed Penn complete freedom in photographing his garments. That arrangement gave Penn complete freedom to determine how the garments would be photographed, rather than limiting the photographs to a prescribed approach.
According to Aperture, Penn “essentialized Miyake’s structural garments, giving them graphic clarity while turning clothing into living sculpture.” Aperture’s characterization links the photographs’ graphic clarity to Penn’s treatment of Miyake’s structural garments and describes the clothing as becoming living sculpture.
The acclaimed series of photographs was later collected in a book, while many of the photographs can now be found in museum collections. The book brought the series together after the collaboration, and museum collections now hold many of the photographs from it. This record places the photographs both in a later book and among works held by museums.
Gallery 98 has four of these Penn and Miyake posters from the collaboration.
