Lee Alexander McQueen: Mind, Mythos, Muse

Lee Alexander McQueen: Mind, Mythos, Muse is not only the title of this book but also its raison d’être accompanying the exhibition of the same name, currently at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) through October 2022. It a visual presentation of this once-in-a-generation’s brilliant designer’s oeuvre, and the writers explore how this young man was able to translate his thoughts and imagination into reality for the world to see and appreciate.

Said McQueen in 2009, “As far I think the world needs fantasy. Not reality. We have enough reality today. . . . It’s based on fantasy, this collection, and myth and legend.” 

There have been more than a few books that covered his oeuvre, but here the reader is “face to face” with the clothes themselves—not on a runway, not on a model, but on mannequins so that a visual library and vocabulary was formed to create the “language” of McQueen. Essentially, there is no distraction of venue, runway antics, models, or any distractions that might take away from the clothes themselves.

Said Alexander McQueen in 2002, “What you see in the work is the person himself. And my heart is in my work.”

Yes, you will read about the inspirations and background for his collections, which offer a context, but what you truly get to examine is the glory of what he left behind in the manifestation of wearable art. What the prospective reader will be exposed to is not just the over-the-top editorial pieces that are thrust in front of every fashion reader’s eyes, but also, we, as readers, can examine the workmanship, the accessories, and the innovative, fearless, and creative forces that drove McQueen.