Speakers’ biographiesRSS

Alessandra Arezzi Boza

Lecture: Training Creativity: GLAM Institutions as an “Open Source” for Education, Creativity, Innovation in Fashion

Bio: After obtaining her MA in the History of Contemporary Art at the University of Florence, she has been working since 1998 as a freelance fashion historian and curator in fashion museums and private fashion houses‘ archives, curating exhibitions and catalogues and specializing in projects related to conservation, valorization and digital management of fashion collections.

 

She has carried out publishing, lecturing and teaching activities on these subjects in institutions such as Polimoda Florence, Milan Polytechnic, Milan Statale University and Richmond University.

 

Since 2001, she is the curator of the Emilio Pucci Archive Foundation, coordinating the project of digital documentation, storage and care of the collections while curating the maison’s exhibitions and publications. She has also contributed to several research projects on fashion. She is currently Communication director of the European Community funded Europeana Fashion project for Fondazione Rinascimento Digitale.

 

Maria Canella

Lecture: Fashion Studies between history and new projects

Bio: Maria Canella, graduate in the History of the Risorgimento and PhD in History of European society, teaches Fashion History and Documentation, Fashion Communication and Publishing and Women’s History and Gender Identity at the University of Milan. She is also working with the laboratory of brand development and corporate fashion in the course of Fashion Design at the Faculty of Industrial Design at Milan Polytechnic.

She is secretary of the Interdepartmental Centre MIC “Moda Immagine Consumi” at the University of Milan and co-director of the series published by Mic and Skira; president of the Association “Memoria e Progetto” for the development and valorisation of historical and artistic heritage in Lombardy; coordinator for Lombardy of the national project “Fashion Archives of the Twentieth century” and member of the scientific committee of the series “Modern and Contemporary Society” edited by Franco Angeli.

 

Mariuccia Casadio

Lecture: Museums, Archives and Fashion, between Past and Future: Disclosing New Forms of Creativity through a Contemporary and Interdisciplinary Dialogue.

Bio: Mariuccia Casadio, is an art and style reviewer, consultant and exhibition curator.

She teaches History of Fashion and Photography in IED institute. She has held lectures about the relationship between fashion and art in many different international universities.

She is an art consultant for Vogue Italia, in which she curates a section about the connections between contemporary art and fashion trends.

 

 

 

Anja Aronowsky Cronberg

Lecture: Panel: Handling New Media in Fashion

Bio: Anja Aronowsky Cronberg studied Fine Art at Central Saint Martins and History of Design at the Royal College of Art in London, before becoming the Head of PR at Acne Studios and Editor of ACNE Paper in Stockholm.

In 2009, she set up the Paris-based annual journal Vestoj, which has since gone on to publish three issues: on fashion and material memories, on fashion and magic and on fashion and shame. She and her team are currently working on their fourth issue, on fashion and power, due in July 2013.

 

 

 

 

Kaat Debo

Lecture: Repositioning MoMu in a Digital World

Bio: Kaat Debo joined MoMu, Antwerp’s Fashion Museum, after studying literature and philosophy at the Universities of Antwerp and Berlin.

From 2001 up to 2008 she was responsible for the museum’s exhibition policy and curated several of its shows. In 2007 and 2008 she was editor in chief of A MAGAZINE. In 2009, she was appointed general director of MoMu. She regularly lectures and writes on contemporary fashion.

 

 

 

Linda Loppa

Lecture: Momenting the Memento – Building Bridges

Bio: Linda Loppa has over 25 years of experience in teaching fashion design, as well as 25 years of experience in directing a fashion department. She has 10 years of management experience at Flanders Fashion Institute and 8 years as director of the Fashion Museum in Antwerp.

Since 2007, Linda has been the director of Polimoda, International Institute of Fashion Design & Marketing. She was born in Antwerp (Belgium) to a family of Italian origin and has a career spanning over 40 years in fashion. Today, she is one of the most noted faces of international education in the industry.

 

 

 

Maria Luisa Frisa

Lecture: Talent and Discipline

Bio: Maria Luisa Frisa, fashion critic and curator, is director of the Degree Programme in Fashion Design (BA) at Università IUAV di Venezia. She is also president of MISA Associazione Italiana degli Studi di Moda (Italian Association for Fashion Studies).

She curated, among the others, the exhibitions (and catalogues): Uniform. Order and Disorder (Florence-New York, 2001), Excess. Fashion and the Underground in the 80s (Florence, 2004), Italian Eyes. Fashion Photography from 1951 to Today (Milan, 2005), Lei e le altre. Moda e stili nelle riviste RCS dal 1930 a oggi (Milan, 2011), Diana Vreeland After Diana Vreeland (Venice, 2012), Lucy+Jorge Orta: Fabulae Romanae (Rome, 2012). Her last book is Italian Fashion Now (Marsilio, 2011).

 

 

 

Gabriele Monti

Lecture: Panel: Handling New Media in Fashion

Bio: Gabriele Monti, PhD, is a researcher in Fashion Design and Theory at Università IUAV di Venezia, where he teaches Concept Design in Fashion Design. His doctoral work in semiotics at Bologna University focused on fashion curating and exhibitions in relation to contemporary fashion design.

Monti’s more recent projects include contributions to Walter Albini and His Times: All Power to the Imagination (ed. by Maria Luisa Frisa and Stefano Tonchi, Marsilio, 2010) and Fashion at the Time of Fascism: Italian Modernist Lifestyle 1922-1943 (ed. by Mario Lupano and Alessandra Vaccari, Damiani, 2009). He co-curated exhibitions and co-edited catalogues for Elda Cecchele: In forma di tessuto (Marsilio, 2010) and Lei e le altre: Moda e stili nelle riviste RCS dal 1930 a oggi (Marsilio, 2011).

 

 

Raffaello Napoleone

Lecture: Layers of Fashion Culture

Bio: Raffaello Napoleone is CEO of Pitti Immagine, a company that organizes international trade fairs for the industry of fashion where he started in 1989 as General Manager.

His previous experiences include the responsibility for the HR at Salvatore Ferragamo, at Les Laboratoires Servier (a French pharmaceutical company) and, at the very early stages of his working life, a yacht brokerage firm that became a small boat construction operation.

He also sits at other companies’ and institutions’ boards (Ente Moda Italia, Fiera Digitale, Confindustria Firenze, Ente Cassa Firenze, Yoox, Teatro della Pergola). He has a degree in Law.

 

 

Geer Oskam

Lecture: Panel: Handling New Media in Fashion

Bio: Europeana.eu is Europe’s catalyst for digitized cultural heritage; giving access to over 25 million digital objects from Europe’s leading museums, libraries, and archives. As Senior Marketing Specialist, Geer Oskam, is currently responsible for creating end user engagement concepts, organising crowd source projects and managing (online) marketing strategies.

 

 

 

 

Marco Pecorari

Lecture: Panel: Handling New Media in Fashion

Bio: Marco Pecorari is completing his PhD in Contemporary Fashion Theory at the Centre for Fashion Studies at Stockholm University, with a thesis entitled “The perfomativity of contemporary fashion ephemera: a case study of the archive of the Fashion Museum of the Province of Antwerp (MoMu)”.

He also writes for several fashion, arts, and cultural magazines.

 

 

 

 

 

Diane Pernet

Lecture: Panel: Handling New Media in Fashion

Bio: One of the fashion world’s most recognizable faces, Diane Pernet, began her career as a fashion designer and photographer in New York before relocating to Paris in the early 90s, where she became a journalist, critic (Elle.com, Vogue.fr) and film-maker. Pernet is part of several pioneering online media, working as editor-in-chief and consultant for Iqons, the biggest social networking site for fashion and her own internationally renowned fashion blog www.ashadedviewonfashion.com, which she launched in 2005. In 2008, her blog was featured in an exhibition and panel at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute in New York as part of its series “Blog.Mode: Addressing Fashion”.

Pernet is a regular curator of fashion and photography festivals, as well as a talent scout for the annual Festival d’Hyeres in France, and for the White Club, a fashion business support network in Italy.

In 2006, she co-founded the traveling film festival “You Wear It Well” with Dino Dinco which has been screened at prestigious institutions worldwide such as the Guggenheim Bilbao (Spain), the Flanders Fashion Institute/MoMu Fashion Museum Antwerp (Belgium), la Biennale d’Arnhem (Netherlands), le Mudac (Switzerland), UnHollywood Film Festival (New York) and le Festival International de Mode et de Photographie de Hyères, etc.

“A Shaded View on Fashion Film” is curated by Diane Pernet and it has been submitted to a jury of esteemed professionals from the worlds of cinema, fashion, the arts and media. Some 90 minutes of film, which include documentaries as well as features, are divided over the two or three-day festival. The common thread that binds this diverse program is the use of fashion as the principal subject, theme or cinematic aesthetic. The festival is a study in the drama, power and personification that fashion evokes and commands on screen. The first edition of ASVOFF was launched at the national museum of Paris, Jeu de Paume Sept 26, 27 & 28, 2008.

 

Laudomia Pucci

Lecture: Evolving Perceptions of Fashion

Bio: In 1985, Laudomia Pucci starts working for her father Emilio Pucci.

In 1989, after 2 years experience with Hubert de Givenchy, she became CEO of the family business and negotiated in 2000 the sale of a majority stake to LVMH.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fabio Quaranta

Lecture: Panel: Handling New Media in Fashion

Bio: Fabio Quaranta is a research professor of Fashion Design at IUAV University in Venice. He is also specialized in visual arts and theatre. During his career he participated in Altaroma with the collection “Small Objects of Desire” and curated the “Fashionscape” project in “Fashion on paper”, an event by Maria Luisa Frisa. As a designer, he has presented many collections for men on various catwalks. In 2010, he has won the Who is on Next competition.

 

 

Adelheid Rasche

Lecture: 1.250.000 – Fashion Images tell (Hi)stories

Bio: Dr. Adelheid Rasche, art and fashion historian, senior curator of the Lipperheide Costume Library (Kunstbibliothek, National Museums in Berlin), exhibition curator and book author, consultant for fashion brand heritage.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stefania Ricci

Lecture: The Salvatore Ferragamo Museum: an Example of Brand Heritage

Bio: Stefania Ricci holds a university degree in the Arts, with a specialisation in Art History, from the University of Florence. In 1984, she began working with Palazzo Pitti’s Galleria del Costume as curator for a series of exhibitions. At the same time, she freelanced for Pitti Immagine, organising exhibitions and editing catalogues.

In 1984, she began collaborating with Salvatore Ferragamo, organising the first retrospective on the company’s history in Palazzo Strozzi in Florence, later shown at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London followed by the Los Angeles County Museum. She also took over management of the company’s archive. Two years later, she became curator of the Casa di Mode Emilio Pucci archive for a decade.

In 1995, she became director of Museo Salvatore Ferragamo, to the founding of which she contributed. She is also responsible for Ferragamo’s cultural events around the world. Since becoming director, she has been curator of all exhibitions organised by the museum.

As a researcher and expert in the history of clothing and fashion, Stefania Ricci has written a number of books and essays.

 

Agnès Rocamora

Lecture: Panel: Handling New Media in Fashion (Keynote Speaker)

Bio: Dr. Agnès Rocamora is a reader in Social and Cultural Studies at the London College of Fashion, University of the Arts London.

She is the author of Fashioning the City: Paris, Fashion and the Media (I.B. Tauris, 2009). Her writing in the field of fashion, on the fashion media and on fashion blogging has appeared in various journals, including Fashion Theory, Sociology, and the Journal of Consumer Culture. She is a co-editor of The Fashion Studies Handbook (Berg, forthcoming 2013) and of Fashion Media: Past and Present (Berg, forthcoming 2013) and a contributor to Fashion’s World Cities (Berg, 2006) and Fashion as Photograph (I.B. Tauris, 2008). She is currently developing her work on fashion and new media.

 

 

Marie Schuller

Lecture: Panel: Handling New Media in Fashion

Bio: Marie Schuller is a London based fashion filmmaker and director. Marie has been working for Nick Knight’s SHOWstudio in London for the past 3 years, where she holds the position of head of fashion film.

Her directing work has been screened internationally from the Kunsthalle in Vienna to the Centre Pompidou in Paris and the Fashion and Textile Museum in London. In addition, she has been awarded the ‘Best Director of Fashion’ prize at ASVOFF Barcelona in 2012.

Marie was raised in Germany and resettled to England in 2004. She studied filmmaking at the National Film and Television School and completed her MA in Photography at the University of the Arts London.

 

 

Sonnet Stanfill

Lecture: The V&A presents La Moda: Italian Fashion since 1945

Bio: Sonnet Stanfill is curator of 20^th century and contemporary fashion at the V&A, where she has worked since 1999.

Her exhibition projects at the V&A include Ossie Clark (2003), New York Fashion Now (2007) and co-curation of Ballgowns: British Glamour Since 1950 (2012) for which she also co-edited the accompanying publication. Her exhibition on Italian fashion, along with a corresponding publication, opens at the museum in 2014.

Sonnet has published and lectured widely on varied aspects of fashion design. Before joining the V&A, Sonnet received her MA in the history of dress from London’s Courtauld Institute after working as a fashion buyer in New York.

 

 

Valerie Steele

Lecture: Fashion Designers, A-Z: The Collection of The Museum at FIT

Bio: Valerie Steele is director and chief curator of The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, where she has organized more than 20 exhibitions since 1997, including Daphne Guinness (2011), Gothic: Dark Glamour (2008), Love & War: The Weaponized Woman (2006), London Fashion (2002) and The Corset (2000). She is also founding editor of the influential scholarly quarterly Fashion Theory: The Journal of Dress, Body & Culture.

A prolific author, Steele combines serious scholarship (and a Yale Ph.D.) with a rare ability to communicate with general audiences. She is author or co-author of more than a dozen books, including Fashion Designers, A-Z (Taschen, 2012), The Impossible Collection Fashion (Assouline, 2011), Daphne Guinness (Yale, 2011), Japan Fashion Now (Yale, 2010), Gothic: Dark Glamour (Yale, 2008), The Corset: A Cultural History (Yale, 2001), Paris Fashion (Oxford, 1988, revised edition, Berg,1999), Fifty Years of Fashion (Yale, 1997), Fetish: Fashion, Sex and Power (Oxford University Press, 1996), Women of Fashion: 20^th-Century Designers (Rizzoli, 1991), and Fashion and Eroticism (Oxford, 1985). She is also editor-in-chief of the three-volume Encyclopedia of Clothing and Fashion (Scribners, 2005), abridged as The Berg Companion to Fashion (Berg, 2011). Several of her books have been translated into Chinese, French, German, Italian, Portuguese and Russian.

Steele has appeared on many television programs, including The Oprah Winfrey Show and Undressed: The Story of Fashion. After she appeared on the PBS special, The Way We Wear. She was described in The Washington Post as one of “fashion’s brainiest woman.”  The subject of numerous profiles, such as “The Freud of Fashion” by Suzy Menkes for the International Herald Tribune, “Fashion Professor” in Forbes. and “High-Heeled Historian” in The New York Times, she was listed as number 18 of “Fashion’s 50 Most Powerful” in the Daily News (August 27, 2009). As author, curator, editor, and public intellectual, Steele has been instrumental in creating the modern field of fashion studies and in raising public awareness of the cultural and social significance of fashion.

 

Louise Wallenberg

Lecture: Challenges, Obstacles, and Possibilities: Establishing Fashion Studies at Stockholm University

Bio: Louise Wallenberg is Associate Professor in Film and Fashion studies, and director of the Centre for Fashion Studies at Stockholm University. She has published on queer cinema, gender theory and fashion. Currently, she is co-editing two volumes, Fashion and Modernism (Stockholm: Carlsson förlag, 2013) and Fashion, Film, and Urban Space: Re-Visiting the 1960s. Her other publications include Nordic Fashion Studies (co-edited, Stockholm: AXL Books, 2012); Mode: en tvärvetenskaplig betraktelse (co-edited, Stockholm: Raster, 2009), “Fashion Photography, Phallocentrism, and Feminist Critiques”, in eds. Vicki Karaminas, Joe Hancock and Toni Johnson-Woods, Fashion in Popular Culture (Oxford: Intellect Books, 2013), “Designing Desirable Men: Fashion, Style and Masculinity in 1930s Cinema”, in Star and Seam, ed. Dirk Laundwert (Antwerp: MoMu Press, 2011); and “Buggering Freud and Deleuze: Towards A Theory of Queer Masochism”, in Journal of Aesthetics and Culture (2010).ghostwriting