Recreating 'Dirty Looks': A Barbican Exhibit
- Abbey Villasis
- 2 hours ago
- 4 min read
Fashion has long been characterised by glamorous and perfect surfaces that will not tolerate any form of 'dirt', defined by anthropologist Mary Douglas as 'matter out of place'. However, over the past fifty years, forms of both real and fake dirt have infiltrated and decorated fashion, symbolising rebelliousness, romanticism and decay as well as concepts of transience, spiritually and regeneration.
— Dirty Looks, Desire and Decay in Fashion (Exhibition Guide), Barbican
The Standard called it “a feast for the eyes and the mind,” while The Guardian described it as “a mucky joy to behold.” Despite its modest-sounding premise, 'Dirty Looks' curated by Karen Van Godtsenhoven, is one of the most beautiful exhibitions I have ever visited. Highly relevant too, considering I had just read Susan Strasser's Waste and Want in December (worth the read if you're interested in sustainability and design.) It ran from 25 September 2025 to 25 January 2026 at the Barbican, and proved itself to be something truly special. I actually stumbled across it through an internet ad, which led me to the imposing - and, if you’re also chronically online, allegedly 'haunted' - Barbican Centre, the subject of more than a few eerie reels exploring its roots in an ancient past. Given how successful the exhibition was, and with tickets priced at just £15 (cheaper than some drinks, if we’re being honest), it probably didn’t need the extra promotion. Still, I’m very glad it found its way to me. If you’re drawn to fashion, art school, upcycling, soft pastels and cool tones, or even broader reflections on the digitisation of the world, then you're in the right place.
The theme of this room centered on the physical body, and on shifting ideas of feminine beauty and ugliness. It featured a clip from a 90s documentary in which American high school students expressed open hostility toward those we would now describe as 'alt' kids, primarily girls. The documentary (linked below) played on a television within the space, while mannequins dressed in corresponding looks stood throughout the room, one example shown above. The girls in the film were labelled as 'dirty' and accused of not showering. One repeatedly defended herself, insisting that she did shower, but that she simply refused to conform to conventional beauty standards, making an intentional choice to express herself in ways that made her feel comfortable and authentic. Skating culture and adjacent subcultures appealed to her sensibilities. Unknowingly, she was ahead of her time: only a few decades later, young people across the globe would aspire to the very look she embodied, fuelled by growing disillusionment with dominant systems, rigid beauty norms, and class divisions. What is often dismissed as messy or unpolished in this aesthetic is, in fact, quite meaningful. The dyed hair, the exaggerated accessories, the assembled layers - there is a reworking of girlhood embedded within it. It borrows from a masculine sort of beauty that is rustic and effortlessly beautiful. It's a reimagining of femininity on one's own terms and an attempt to become something next-to-human, by adorning the parts of our bodies that can be electric orange, neon pink, long or short if we so choose. This aesthetic creates space for young people forge their own identity through colour, expressive jewelry, baggy clothing, (etc.)
Dirty Girls,
Directed by Michael Lucid
1996
Excerpts, 05:22 min
Dutch designers Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren, known as Viktor&Rolf, created this voluminous dress as part of their winning collection for the Hyères festival in 1993, based on the idea of ‘fragments of clothes’. The silhouette of the dress evokes an archaeological landscape with a heavily distressed wool covered in silver sequins. The collection became definitive of the designers’ practice, which straddles fashion and art.
(Excerpt from Desire and Decay in Fashion, Barbican)
In the photo above, the look on the left features a dress constructed from metal spoons, while the central figure, slightly off-center yet still facing forward, wears a top that appears to be made of blue-stained margarita glasses, delicately linked by silver chains that drape across the mannequin’s neck and shoulders.
...Harking back to the 19th century trope of the fashion designer as a Parisian ragpicker, these foraging designers combine an eye for beauty with a spiritual longing to imbue the discarded with a deeper meaning and purpose.
It's easy to grow tired or distracted in exhibitions and museums, but this one held my attention throughout. Part of that was undoubtedly because it centered on fashion, yet it was also due to the strength of its theme and how it connected to prominent ideas in contemporary theory. It was refreshing to see a major institution spotlight the figure of the ragpicker and to encounter a three-dimensional example of high-fashion upcycling, such as the spoon dress, which offered a strikingly literal interpretation of what the exhibition might describe as a 'dirty look.' At the end of the exhibit, I found myself thinking, I really hope the Barbican hosts more exhibitions like this. The theme, the garments, everything came together beautifully to create a genuinely atmospheric environment. In a way, it felt more like visiting a museum: people moved quietly from room to room, pausing for several minutes in each space to analyse the collections and decode the message behind them. Of course, these are not all the looks from the exhibition, just the ones I found most captivating.
All Images Courtesy of Author
Written and Edited by
Abbey Villasis, Co-Fashion Editor
