Why the Helmut Lang exhibition is the best at democratising fashion

The MAK's new retrospective on the work of Helmut Lang fits perfectly into today's fashion world. At a time when one scandal after another rocks the big luxury fashion houses, critical voices are growing louder. Social media is giving more and more outsiders the opportunity to publicly express their disappointment with the state of the industry. Helmut Lang repeatedly focused his work on opening up the fashion industry to a wider audience, thus laying the foundation for the criticism voiced by outsiders today.

However, the rise of semi-professional fashion criticism through social networks is not without its problems. It can lead to potentially misleading information being accepted uncritically. One example of this is the reporting by TikToker labbeye, whose flawed research on the designer Paul Harnden had a massive impact on his biography on social media. One can sometimes get the impression that the main thing is just to post something about a topic without really having looked into it.

As French philosopher Jean Baudrillard once pointed out, photography is ‘a kind of escape from dealing with reality. It captures reality technically and relieves people of the need to describe and reflect on things themselves.’ It's all about posting cultural goods such as books or museum exhibitions, but no longer about understanding their content.

MAK Exhibition View, 2025 - © kunst-dokumentation.com/MAK 

That's why I saw a certain danger in the announced retrospective. What if it's just about laying the groundwork for the perfect social media post? What if it's just about presenting the designer's clothes in an Instagram-friendly way? What if visiting the exhibition will just mean weaving your way through people taking pictures and only being able to see the exhibition through the screen of the person in front of you, who is blocking your view as they search for the ‘perfect shot’? Fortunately, the opposite was the case. 

Helmut Lang's permission to hold an exhibition about his work in the fashion industry came with one condition: it should not be a clothing exhibition. As a result, the entire exhibition contains only around two dozen garments. All these garments are attached to the wall instead of being displayed on mannequins. In one display case, the garments even lie on the floor as if they had fallen off the hanger. Clearly, the aim here is not to explain the designer's work solely based on his clothes. Rather, the exhibition attempts to explain Lang's restructuring of the fashion industry through experiential spaces. Visitors are invited to discover the designer's past career - from his shop concepts to the backstage area of his shows - for themselves.  

CD-ROM for Helmut Lang Collection Hommes Femmes Séance de Travail Défilé # Hiver 98/99 (1998). - MAK Helmut Lang Archive, LNI 584-5-5. Courtesy of hl-art.

This unconventional perspective is evident right from the first room of the exhibition. It is not his garments or his first show but Helmut Lang's autumn/winter 1998 collection that is shown here on a large screen. This will be the first fashion show to have taken place digitally. Instead of invitation cards, only CDs were sent out to the VIP guests. In addition, the collection was available to everyone on the Helmut Lang website. The designer recognised ‘that the Internet would grow into something much bigger than imaginable’. A medium that would advance the democratisation of knowledge by making information accessible to all. From this point on, fashion shows were no longer reserved only for invited guests but could be seen by everyone. 

Helmut Lang's drive for democratisation is explored further in the next room. In a display case, there is an advertising sign from a New York taxi, which is branded with only his logo and his website address. In 1998, he promoted his brand directly in New York city life. With his advertising campaign, he broke with the prevailing understanding of luxury at the time: news about fashion were no longer only accessible to the rich and beautiful, but to everyone walking through the streets of New York.

Helmut Lang, interior of the Helmut Lang flagship store, 80 Greene Street, New York, designed by Helmut Lang and Gluckman Mayner Architects (1997), photography by Paul Warchol (1998).

Behind the display case with the taxi sign, several large black containers confront the visitor. What has been recreated here are the flagship stores of Helmut Lang that opened around the world in the 1990s. The containers are open on one side where the garments were displayed, creating a corridor-like display layout. This arrangement compelled consumers to engage with the garments directly, focusing solely on the object in front of them, free from distraction. Instead of clothing, the exhibition displays plans, sketches, and photos of the stores from that time. Similar to the stores themselves, visitors are able to concentrate on the information presented without interruption.

The replica of the designer’s shops is followed by a replica of his runway presentations. In a large white cube, the exhibition gives visitors an insight into how Lang’s presentations were structured in the 1990s. Printed on the floor is the seating plan for one of his shows. Beneath the visitors’ feet are the names of figures such as Carine Roitfeld, Fabien Baron, and Suzy Menkes. In the middle of the room is a large screen showing a series of Lang's shows. What is missing is the clothing. Instead, there are stick-shaped sculptures spread out around the room. 

Lang created the artworks entitled ‘Make It Hard’ after leaving the fashion industry, using garments from his personal archive that he shredded, dipped in resin and painted. The direct encounter between the sculptures and the runway footage once again underscores the exhibition’s aim. Almost the only clothing exhibited in the context of the Helmut Lang shows has been destroyed. The focus is less on a detailed analysis of his garments, but more on providing an experience of Helmut Lang's universe at that time. An attempt at education through personal experience. 

MAK Exhibition View, 2025 - © kunst-dokumentation.com/MAK

And yet a brief analysis of Helmut Lang's clothing is indispensable. Away from the tour, in a small black container, Lang's complete abstraction of garments is on display. Several items from his ‘accessoire-vêtements’ collection are attached to the wall in pairs, sorted by category and colour. From a thin bra strap, consisting of only four strips of fabric, several processes of adding and removing fabric ultimately lead to the standard tank top. Through the artistic process of abstraction, Helmut Lang exposes the structure of his garments, turning deconstruction into enlightenment.

The exhibition concludes with the place where every fashion show begins and ends: the backstage. Here, alongside a few accessories and - what is probably the most Instagrammable object in the exhibition - an Astro biker jacket from the autumn/winter 1999 collection, you will find Juergen Teller's photo documentation of the backstage area at Lang's shows in the 1990s. The pictures, taken spontaneously and characterized by a certain imperfection, are nowadays no longer provocative with the rise of the ugly-chic aesthetic. But at the time, they broke with the clean and tidy photographic practices of luxury fashion. And in addition to this norm-breaking approach, these shots of the usually hidden backstage achieved one thing: they democratised fashion. The photographs made work processes, previously accessible only to professionals, public and visible to everyone.

Backstage Photograph by Juergen Teller of Kirsten Owen, Helmut Lang Collection Hommes Femmes Séance De Travail Defile # Hiver 97/98, Paris - Courtesy of hl-art

Helmut Lang was a driving force in making fashion more accessible. Whether it was introducing workwear such as denim into a high-fashion context, eliminating the stage for models at his shows to put them on the same level as the audience, or using different media forms such as the internet or backstage photographs to reveal previously hidden processes, all aspects had the goal of opening up fashion to a wider public.

It is precisely this democratisation of access and opinion on fashion that is more important than ever in today's world. The prevailing problematic structures of the industry can only be reconsidered and redesigned by independent critical voices. As fashion journalist Philippe Pourhashemi so accurately put it in an episode of the Stylezeitgeist podcast: ‘I see the fashion industry as Marie Antoinette, totally self-referential, in a bubble, not wanting to give up their privileges. And I see voices from the outside starting to shatter that bubble.’

Nevertheless, the democratisation process triggered by the internet must be critically reflected upon. In an article from 2013, fashion journalist Suzy Menkes deplored the attention-seeking transformation of the fashion crowd. She goes on to write that she is ‘sceptical that anyone can be a critic who passes judgement after watching a show on Style.com.’ The like-driven social media culture carries the risk of incomplete or inaccurate reporting, with the primary goal being to get the most likes for a post. 

Democratisation is important, but it can only succeed through education. Outsider opinions can be a driving force and should not be ignored (otherwise you probably wouldn't be reading this article) yet they must be grounded in solid knowledge. Helmut Lang recognised this back in the 1990s and responded by liberating fashion from spectacle and mystery, revealing what had previously remained hidden behind the glamorous façade of luxury.

And so does the exhibition at the MAK. By leaving out photogenic clothing items and creating spaces for experiences, – which are indivisible on social media – the exhibition succeeds in forcing visitors to really reflect on the information presented and not be distracted by thoughts of their next post. After all, a photo of a letter in which André Leon Talley asks Helmut Lang for a coat only means something to you if you have actually read and understood it. 

Today, institutions such as the MAK are tasked with supporting Helmut Lang’s project of democratising fashion, adapting it to the modern age through sustainable education. Because only when you know how the gates to Marie Antoinette’s cake party are built can you tear them down.