Evening dress

Geoffrey Beene

1968 · plastic, silk · Costume Institute

Active sports have repeatedly inspired designers of women's sportswear, though chiefly by the sports in which women engage. Football is yet a male preserve; even football watching is defined as a male activity. Beene tells the story of being solicited by a "football widow," one whose football-season afternoons are lost to a husband watching games on television, to make a knock-out dress to get her husband's interest even on a bowl Sunday. Beene took to the field and rendered the football jersey into a sequinned evening gown slinky enough, opulent enough to take attention away from the game, at least for half-time.

Artist

Geoffrey Beene

Date

1968

Medium

plastic, silk

Culture

American

Department

Costume Institute

Credit line

Gift of Geoffrey Beene, 1983