Best dressed goes to me
Judging Met Gala looks while rocking leggings and a sweatshirt...again.
The first Monday in May.
The Met Gala.
America’s flagrant display of ostentatious wealth.
Hot take: there should be more flagrant displays of ostentatious wealth.
What most people forget to realize is that the Met Gala is first and foremost a fundraiser for the Costume Institute, a department within the Met. For Americans, the Costume Institute is essentially a one-of-a-kind resource to study fashion and historical garments.
As any bride can tell you, fabric is noticeably difficult to preserve. It cost me $250 to have my custom wedding dress sealed into a box (with no windows) in the hopes it will remain pristine in my attic. And that’s one, relatively unimportant garment. The cost and delicate work to preserve garments that actually matter is extensive. The Costume Institute is one of the very few places in our country doing this work. They have over 33,000 items in their collection, representing over seven centuries of clothing and accessories from men, women, and children.
Call me old fashioned, but if billionaires exist I want them to fund the arts. I want them to build beautiful architecture and support cultural institutions. They should be throwing money at museums and the like, keeping our vital historical records alive. They should be funding innovation and research and propelling our society forward.
The Medicis basically funded the Italian Renaissance. We have Grand Central Station (and Anderson Cooper) because of the Vanderbilts; they funded its construction twice. Philanthropists should be using their money to fund and advance our society (not making dick shaped rockets for 10 minute joy rides themselves).
It is not uncommon in fundraising to throw an event, a gala even. Politicians are doing this. Institutions focused on Cancer Research are doing this. Theaters, museums, cultural institutions, etc. all do this to inspire their donors to give more and to celebrate what their giving supports. Tickets are often overpriced, often sold only in tables, the bulk of which goes to support whatever the cause may be. The Met Gala is the same. We (as plebeian poors) are just not usually privy to the guest lists and their parade of outfits.
So yes, it is gross to see the wealth disparity play out in real time. (Was Hayley Bayley’s Marie Antoinette moment completely out of touch last year? Absolutely.) But isn’t it also wonderful to see wearable art in motion, celebrated and on display? Isn’t it wonderful that this event helps keep museum admittance to a bare minimum, basically free for locals and affordable for visitors?
I hope those tickets go up in price, maybe they’ll hit $100,000. I’m not in a philanthropist’s tax bracket. I will never attend this event.
I’ll be the first to say billionaires shouldn’t exist. No person should be dying of starvation in a world where we have enough food, we just don’t get enough profits from feeding people for free. Flint, Michigan still doesn’t have clean water. Kids are denied meals at school because they can’t pay it. Wasn’t Elon told he had enough money to solve world hunger and decided to buy Twitter instead? Billionaires are a scourge on our planet’s finite resources.
But since billionaires do exist, they better do something good with their money.
And in a time, where fascists push for uniformity, it is a time to be bold and loud. It’s the time to celebrate art and culture. In WW2 the Allies created the ‘Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives program’, a program to document, collect, protect, and preserve art from the spoils of war (inspiration for the movie Monuments Men).
We tell our stories through art. And what is good fashion if not wearable art?
It’s easy to simply critique the looks and their commitment to the yearly theme, to treat the event as simply a fashion show. While the entrance might be grand, it is only a portion of the evening.
This year, with the theme focused on Black Dandyism to coincide with Superfine: Tailoring Black Styles exhibit, the event raised the most it ever has in its 77 year tenure. Over $31 million will help preserve future collections. Because of this funding, graduate students and researchers, doctoral students and scholars, and even budding designers, can access the museum and its contents without having to pay exorbitant member fees or admission.
Because of exclusive events like the Met Gala, art can remain accessible.
Sure, there are a lot of things I’d change about the world we live in, but sometimes you have to acknowledge that successes despite the systems.
