Dior’s Spring 2021 Ready-To-Wear collection appeared to be backed by a collection of enormous stained glass windows. Upon closer inspection, these towering art pieces were actually collages, created by Italian artist Lucia Marcucci. The patterns and fabrics chosen to grace the runway by designer Maria Grazia Chiuri mirror the art in their subtle complexity.

The runway show is preceded by a film from Alina Marazzi, who was given total freedom as to how she’d like to dive into the work of Marcucci. The end result is a sort of dreamy look back over the artist’s inspiration and final projects. As if visually painted into one of her own collages, Marcucci is overlaid by images of her work, and explains, “I took the language of sport, of newspapers, of politics and I made a collage.”

Chiuri’s collection is said to also be inspired by the ideas of authors including Susan Sontag and Virginia Woolf. Much like their many influential works, the clothes designed by Chiuri revisit the intention and basic principles of a thing, in this case: clothing. The men’s dress shirt and woman’s dress are reinvented. Cultures spanning from Japan to Indonesia are explored. The whole project is tied up in paisley and lace.

As the models exhibited these garments down the length of the runway, they were scored by the Sequenza 9.3 ensemble, directed by Catherine Simonpietri, singing Lucia Ronchetti’s “Sangu di rosa” in the Voceri tradition.

View the film and runway show below.