BATH IN FASHION:'Ladies, Let's Rip!' An installation by Julie Verhoeven sponsored by the Bath School of Art & Design

‘Ladies, Let’s Rip!’ is a bespoke installation by Julie Verhoeven for Bath in Fashion 2013, sponsored by Bath Spa University.This artwork at The Holburne Museum will patchwork together the historical and the everyday, painterly and punk rock featuring fantastical figures – a new take on the classical Gainsborough Portraits that were themselves the Georgian version of celebrity culture.

This unique installation presents a rare opportunity to gain an insight in to the world and work of Julie Verhoeven, who has collaborated internationally with labels like Louis Vuitton, Versace, H&M and Mulberry.

Julie said, ‘At the Holburne, I am not only attracted by the excesses and obsessive nature of the collection, but also by the overtly staged, grandiose portraiture in the picture gallery. The grouping of portraits of characters performing in theatrical costume attracted me. Finery and fakery. In my installation I hope to highlight the same heightened sense of performance, vanity in dress and exuberance but with humour and spirit. Tailors dummies, shop mannequins, living statues and all modes of display. Ladies, Let’s Rip!’

Alexander Sturgis, Director of the Holburne says, "We can’t wait to welcome Julie Verhoeven’s subversive and eccentric characters into the Holburne to see what they get up to in our garden and to eaves-drop on the conversations they strike up with our eighteenth-century portraits. It’s bound to be lively."