A project in collaboration with artist Lionel Estève for the presentation of the
Fursac Spring-Summer 2025 collection.
In partnership with Perrotin and the musée Picasso Paris.
On the occasion of the Paris fashion week, Fursac invited the artist Lionel Estève to
showcase six of his creations alongside the spring-summer 2025 collection designed
by Fursac’s creative director, Gauthier Borsarello.
Presented at the heart of the musée Picasso Paris, a venue dedicated to an artist
renowned for blending disciplines, this project is born from a desire to explore the
meaning of clothing in different contexts but also the relationship between fashion
and art. The resulting exhibition is an original dialogue between a series of artworks
and a collection of garments.
The juxtaposition of these two worlds of fashion and art in the show exemplifies their
elective affinities and draws an emotional moodboard of the Fursac SS25 collection.
Lionel Estève’s creations evoke themes such as nature, water, the passage of time, and
the power of physical elements, all serving as inspirations for Borsarello’s wardrobe,
tinged this season with sea air, the Basque coast, and surfing.
Beyond the visual and sensory stimulation created by the interplay of colors and
materials, this cross-pollination between art and clothing aims to provoke questions.
When does the notion of art come into play? What is its purpose? What remains of the
function of clothing? What distinction can be made between art and craftsmanship?
Between an artist and a fashion designer? What is the impact of image on our relationship to art, objects, and textiles? What emotional connection do we have with what we wear? How can creation and commerce be reconciled?
«It is the viewer who makes the work,» said Marcel Duchamp. So, it is up to you to
be carried along on this journey between two worlds, to try to answer these open
questions, and perhaps to bring forth new reflections.
“proche de l’horizon ” exhibition
20-22 june 2024
Picasso Museum Paris
5 rue de thorigny
75003 Paris
GAUTHIER BORSARELLO
At 34 years of age, Gauthier Borsarello is considered a go-to expert on vintage
clothing in France, and has built up an archive of over 2,000 unlabeled items of notable
significance. He has been an avid enthusiast of militaria, workwear and American
menswear from a young age. He has been involved in numerous projects, each with the
objective of fusing contemporary design with the style of times gone by.
Now Fursac’s creative director, a role he took in January 2021, Gauthier Borsarello
also founded the magazine l’étiquette as well as the podcast habitudes (so press) with
journalist Marc Beaugé and the vintage fashion shop Le Vif (Paris 16th).
LIONEL ESTÈVE
Lionel Estève experiments with various materials and handcrafted techniques to create
refined objects including – but not limited to – collages, assemblages, sculptures and
mobiles. He sees his work as a source of perpetual learning and exploration through a
multitude of materials, techniques and forms. His unclassifiable mix-media aesthetics
unapologetically eludes the current rhetoric of contemporary art to evoke instead
a sheer sense of beauty.
Whether figurative or abstract, his delicate visions are generally inspired after motifs
found in the natural world or its sensual experience, which is the primary source of
his unbridled creativity. Like a limner illuminating manuscripts, he seeks to go beyond
the mere surface of things and transcend their wonders through gleeful artifice.
When he doesn’t directly adorn real elements such as plants and stones, sometimes
all that remains in his sculptural yet almost diaphanous oeuvre is the mesmerizing
feel of shimmering light or fractal patterns blossoming.
The combination of all these experiences reveals a path that runs through and reveals
a singular way of thinking.
FURSAC
The Fursac wardrobe remains timeless and continuously relevant with frequent
nods to the sartorial zeitgeist. Designed to age beautifully, be repeatedly worn and
eventually passed on to the next generation. Each piece is developed to respond,
and even anticipate, the wearer’s every wish and need. Such is the reward for
developing intelligent cuts, rigorously sourcing materials and making often complex
menswear codes more accessible. Good pieces with a hint of fantasy, extravagance and
flamboyance.
Founded in Paris in 1973 and setting up its first workshops in the French town of Saint-Etienne-de-Fursac, a small town in Creuse from which it takes its name, the brand was
revealed in the 1980s through advertising campaigns anchored in all memories: “la
griffe de l’homme”. Unmistakably French, Fursac’s style remains open-minded. In 1992,
Fursac inaugurated its first Parisian boutique, still open, at 112 rue de Richelieu,
the former premises of 19th century gentleman’s outfitter high life tailor. Over the
years, a more complete wardrobe has been developed in collaboration with the great
Italian mills who have been offering exclusive fabrics to the brand since 2010.
The direction given by Gauthier Borsarello, creative director since 2021, is that of a
meaningful, studied and cultural aesthetic, providing a unique vision of the French
men’s wardrobe. Inspired by his fascination with tailoring as much as French workwear,
each collection pays homage to its legacy and adds to its history.
