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The V&A has announced details for the only major retrospective in Europe of the work of the visionary fashion designer Lee Alexander McQueen. One of the most innovative designers of his generation, McQueen was celebrated for his extraordinary creative talent. He combined a profound grasp of tailoring and eclectic range of influences with a relentless pursuit to challenge the boundaries of art and fashion, blending the latest technology with traditional craftsmanship.

Originated by the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, "Savage Beauty" will be edited and expanded for the V&A’s large exhibition galleries. It will feature 30 additional garments, including some rare early pieces, lent by private individuals and collectors such as Katy England and Annabelle Neilson as well as pieces from the Isabella Blow Collection and the House of Givenchy.

Impressionism, Fashion and Modernity, which will open at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York on February 26, 2013, will present Impressionist masterpieces alongside garments and accessories from the time. The innovative survey will explore how artists responded to and interpreted fashion from the 1860s through the mid-1880s.

The exhibition, which features 79 paintings and 14 dresses, draws stylistic connections between the canvases and the garments. Highlights include Claude Monet’s (1840-1926) Luncheon on the Grass (1865-66), Pierre-Auguste Renoir’s (1941-1919) Lise-The Woman with the Umbrella (1867), Édouard Manet’s (1832-1883) La Parisienne (circa 1875), Edgar Degas’ (1834-1917) The Millinery Shop (circa 1882-86), and Mary Cassatt’s (1844-1926) In the Loge (1878). Many of the works are on loan from museums such as the Paris’ Musée d’Orsay, the Art Institute of Chicago, London’s Courtauld Gallery, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. The exhibition also includes period photographs and illustrations to reinforce the connection between fashion and art.

Impressionism, Fashion, and Modernity will be on view at the Met through May 27, 2013. The exhibition will travel to the Art Institute of Chicago in June 2013.