Costume as Sculpture: The Worlds of Gwen van den Eijnde

Gwen van den Eijnde is a French–Dutch artist and costume designer based in the United States. For the past decade, he has been teaching apparel design at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) in Providence, where he currently serves as Head of Programme.While pursuing his artistic research at the École Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs in Strasbourg, he began creating costumes as sculptural works. His practice explores how the act of wearing a costume can transform one’s presence in space. Through performances, installations, and photography, he has constructed visual worlds and atmospheres in which the costumes form part of a complete scenography. His performances have taken place internationally—in artist residencies, museums, schools, festivals, theatres, and workshops—often in collaboration with practitioners from a wide range of disciplines.In 2011, he led a workshop in the fashion department of the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, where he introduced students to his interest in Polish traditional dress. This experience marked the beginning of his teaching career. He later taught textile design at the Haute École des Arts du Rhin in Mulhouse (France) and has carried out creative research for fashion houses including Hermès and Tiffany & Co.In 2022 and again in 2024, he designed costumes for chamber operas produced by the Boston Early Music Festival: L’Idylle sur la Paix by Jean-Baptiste Lully, La Fête de Rueil by Marc-Antoine Charpentier, and Don Quichotte auf der Hochzeit des Comacho by Georg Philipp Telemann. Continuing to expand his research into folk and historical dress, material culture, and embroidery techniques, van den Eijnde will take part in a major group exhibition on eighteenth-century fashion and its contemporary legacy in Paris in 2026.👉 www.gvde.netSince its inception in 2019, Design Education Talks podcast has served as a dynamic platform for the exchange of insights and ideas within the realm of art and design education. This initiative sprang from a culmination of nearly a decade of extensive research conducted by Lefteris Heretakis. His rich background, intertwining academia, industry, and student engagement, laid the foundation for a podcast that goes beyond the conventional boundaries of educational discourse.See all of our work on on https://linktr.ee/thenewartschoolFollow us on twitter at @newartschoolRead our latest articles at https://newartschool.education/and https://heretakis.medium.com/Equipment used to produce the podcast:Rodcaster pro IIRode NT1 5th generationElgato Low profile Microphone ArmMonster Prolink Studio Pro microphone cableThe rest of the equipment is here 👉https://kit.co/heretakis/podcasting