Helmut Lang presented Helmut Lang Seen By Antwaun Sargent,”Yobwoc” At New York’s Hannah Traore Gallery during New York fashion week.
For Helmut Lang, Sargent presents an artistic presentation of the brand’s autumn 2023 collection. Helmut Lang’s 2004 cowboy t-shirt served as the point of departure for the brand’s autumn 2023 collection and the installation. By depicting the word cowboy through inverted text rather than image, the brand encourages its audience to contemplate the concept of the cowboy in a broader context of identity and myth – completing the t-shirt’s meaning through differing individual associations. Using the garment’s purpose as inspiration, Sargent invited a community of artists to explore the notion of the cowboy as a symbol, both heroic and problematic. Through the use of sound, sculpture, painting and photography, the artists, according to Sargent, aspired “not to create one particular representation.
These artists and the different ways they are approaching this symbol presents a fuller and more complex understanding of this notion of the cowboy.” The installation features works by Turiya Adkins, American Artist, Awol Erizku, Devin B. Johnson, Justen Leroy, Daniel Obasi, and Quay Quinn Wolf. The show highlights several themes: material realities and beauty, broadening consciousness around westward expansion and the great migration, imagining spiritual forces and narrative expression surrounding the cowboy, exploring how black cowboys challenge the traditional historical erasure, and deconstructing tropes of masculinity, community, and desire.
The autumn/winter collection will be presented on february 10th at hannah traore gallery,
as part of the Helmut Lang Seen By Antwaun Sargent “Yobwoc” Exhibition. The autumn 2023 collection will not be physically present in the space, but rather showcased in a video as a part of the installation. The video will be available to view online at www.helmutlang.com starting february 10th.
Four limited edition t-shirts will be available for purchase for $175 each, at the installation: the re-issued cowboy tee, the art tee by Sargent, and two artist tees featuring the works of Awol Erizku and Daniel Obasi.
The Helmut Lang Seen By Antwaun Sargent “Yobwoc” Installation will be on view to the public at the Hannah Traore Gallery at 150 orchard street on the lower east side, from February 11th through February 23rd.
