Born Under A Lucky Star

Christian Dior was just as superstitious as he was a visionary, influenced by coincidences, mystics and their predictions.

- Emmanuelle Bosc

At the Dior spring/summer 2018 show last October, all those invited, before entering the marquee set up on the gardens of the Rodin Museum, had to walk past a large construction site wall, concrete blocks in shambles with bits of rusted iron rods jutting out. The wall was carved with a saying: If life is a game of cards, then we were born unaware of the rules, and yet, we have had to play our hand.

The quote was by Niki de Saint Phalle, whose work is on display at the museum. A friend of the House of Dior, specifically during the time of Marc Bohan (1960-1989), her artistic spirit has become the driving force behind Dior collection. Highlighted during this show were some of her works, such as the Tarot Garden, a sculpture park in Tuscany, which was represented here through embroidery, weaving and prints on skirts made of tulle and denim, leather shorts and brassieres. An aspect that echoes, in a way, of the very delicate princess dresses with the likes of The Hanged Man, The Devil or The Sun embroidered on them, all of which were a part of the very first collection that Maria Grazia Chiuri designed for Dior a year ago. It included silhouettes inspired by the popular feminist vision of the round tarot cards Motherpeace, created in the 1970s by Vicki Noble and Karen Vogel.

A superstitious neo-symbolism, a glimpse of which we saw in the very stylish resort collection show by Dior last spring, in the middle of the Californian desert which has now made its way to the boutiques. A collection that has the right to be put on a pedestal, with pop-up stores dedicated to it where arcanas are the décor, the spaces are filled with tableaus and suspensions of images of The Wheel of Fortune, The High Priestess, and so on.

The fortune-teller of Granville