Press Room

AngloMania

• Exhibition dates: May 4 – September 4, 2006
• Exhibition location: The Annie Laurie Aitken Galleries
• Press preview: Monday, May 1, 10:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.

AngloMania, opening on May 4, 2006, will present an unprecedented selection of works by British designers in The Metropolitan Museum of Art's English Period Rooms – The Annie Laurie Aitken Galleries. A pendant to the acclaimed 2004 Costume Institute exhibition Dangerous Liaisons: Fashion and Furniture in the 18th Century, AngloMania will focus on British fashion from 1976 to 2006, a period of astounding creativity and experimentation.

The exhibition and its accompanying book are made possible by Burberry.

Additional support has been provided by Condé Nast.

To celebrate the opening of the exhibition, the Museum's Costume Institute Benefit Gala, will take place on Monday, May 1, 2006. Rose Marie Bravo, Chief Executive of Burberry, will serve as Honorary Chair of the Gala. Co-Chairs will be Christopher Bailey, Creative Director of Burberry, actress Sienna Miller, and Anna Wintour, editor-in-chief of Vogue.

Over the past 30 years, British fashion has been defined by a knowing and self-conscious historicism. In their search for novelty, designers have looked to past styles with an appetite that is as audacious as it is rapacious. Focusing on their historicizing tendencies, AngloMania will present a series of tableaux based on Britain's literary and artistic traditions. The irony of satirical prints, the romance of landscape paintings, and the glamour and bravado of grand manner portraits will be evoked through a wide spectrum of British designers. A dialogue between the past and the present will be established by engaging the function, decoration, and iconography of The Annie Laurie Aitken Galleries.

AngloMania is a collaboration between The Costume Institute and the Department of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. It is organized by Harold Koda, Curator in Charge, and Andrew Bolton, Associate Curator, both of The Costume Institute, with the support of Ian Wardropper, the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Curator in Charge of the Department of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts. Patrick Kinmonth, artist and opera designer, will serve as Creative Consultant for the exhibition.

The accompanying book AngloMania will be published by The Metropolitan Museum of Art and distributed by Yale University Press.

The exhibition will also be featured on the Museum's website (www.metmuseum.org).