Coexistence, Exercising, Reparation, Healing, Journey and Change are some of the keywords that the new curatorial team used to introduce their vision to the world in an online press event. “These words are the start of an active exchange, between us ánd between us and the audience. Our aim is to move away from the biennial as an isolated event, and to approach it as an ongoing public exercise in which everyone should have a role,” says the team of Fashion Open Studio. "How can we subvert the practices of exhibiting, curating and selecting in this biennial? How do we go beyond talking about it to practicing it? What does it look like, what does it feel like? We are opening up our process from the start, as we want people to experience this with us,” the members of NOT____ENOUGH collective add.

State of Fashion selected the new curatorial team through an Open Call that resulted in a staggering 118 applications from 31 different countries. The selection was made with the support of an international Creative Advisory Council, consisting of Omoyemi Akerele, Otto von Busch, Carla Fernández, Hakan Karaosman, Aditi Mayer and Amanda Pinatih. ‘As we aim for a biennial that represents a multitude of voices, it felt natural to invite two teams to work together,’ says Steven van Teeseling, general director of the Sonsbeek & State of Fashion Foundation. ‘With Fashion Open Studio, we connect with a strong global network, as well as an experienced team of change-makers. With NOT____ENOUGH collective, we invite three visionary ArtEZ alumni back to Arnhem to share fresh perspectives on the future of fashion. We strongly feel that this will lead to synergy and that the collaboration will tie together a multitude of insights and networks.’

The new curatorial team takes over State of Fashion's platform after ‘This is an Intervention’, the online program that culminates in an online exhibition this Friday. The team follows in the footsteps of José Teunissen, who curated State of Fashion’s first biennial in 2018. The next State of Fashion biennial will take place in the spring of 2022 and aims to reach an audience of 40.000 visitors, with an online and an offline program. The theme of the biennial will be announced in June 2021, during the annual Fashion + Design Festival Arnhem.

More information: stateoffashion.org / fashionopenstudio.com / notenoughcollective.com