Installation view of *Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses*, Brooklyn Museum, 2026. (Photo: On White Wall/Paula Abreu Pita)

text by Hank Manning

Clothing may have originally been developed as a form of portable shelter from the elements, but at the Brooklyn Museum, over 140 garments reveal how nature can inspire fashion and how a garment might serve to connect us to, rather than separate us from, the world around us. In this way, Iris van Herpen invites us to shift our gaze to the organisms and systems we tend to overlook—because they are too small or too big, because they’re underground or under skin, or because they’re far under the ocean or off in outer space, or simply because their process of manufacturing is hidden from consumers.

Seijaku, the first dress on display, asserts van Herpen’s persistent goal of finding harmony in chaos, looking at the whole world and attempting to find patterns. For this dress, she suspends a wave that somehow looks more calming than many of the symmetrical 3D-printed patterns that come later. Fittingly, as life on Earth began in the water, the first section (of eleven), “Water and Dreams,” reveals many ways in which movements of water—bubbles, raindrops, waterfalls—inspire her.

Sea life, much of it microscopic, forms an essential part of the world’s ecosystem. Van Herpen uses multidimensional modes of biomimicry; in addition to the stable appearance—shapes and colors—she also considers movement, her outfits simulating the gentle sway of coral or the rhythmic pulsations of a jellyfish. Truly merging biology and fashion, the dress Living Algae contains 150 million bioluminescent algae that light up alongside the wearer’s movement. One of the only dresses kept behind glass, it requires strict maintenance of temperature, humidity, and light cycles to keep the algae alive.

Terrestrial life motivates designs as well. Even some of our smallest neighbors—like bees and their honeycombs—and those seemingly stagnant—like trees’ root networks—form geometrically intricate and often precisely symmetrical systems. Luminous Lichen, replicating fungal networks, could also be said to resemble the wiring of a motherboard. Pioneering 3D printing in 2010, the Crystallization moved skeletons from beneath the skin to above it.

Van Herpen explores the diversity within and across human minds. In “Synesthesia,” she intimates the intertwining of senses by visually representing sound waves. She appropriates mythology, rendering gowns in the forms of metal snakes or items in Bosch paintings. Towards the end of the show, she considers how humans will continue to evolve, with biotechnology and extraterrestrial exploration. In “Cosmic Bloom,” some mannequins hang upside down or sideways to consider the opportunities of fashion in environments with little or no gravity, though the exhibition does not approximate how these billowing dresses would move in outer space.

Throughout, artwork and scientific artifacts complement the dresses, challenging how we categorize the work. With immobile mannequins that the viewer can walk around, the experience differs greatly from a runway show. Here, each dress is its own work of art. The slow pace, encouraged by a somewhat gloomy soundscape by Salvador Breed, van Herpen’s long-time collaborator and life partner, is juxtaposed with the inherent joie de vivre and natural inspiration within the garments; they are like fossils frozen in time.

To be sure, these pieces are not merely museum specimens. Worn in music videos, on musical tours, and on the red carpet, they are titans of popular culture. Repeat clients include Beyoncé, Björk, and Lady Gaga—Photographs of these and other “muses” appear near the show’s end, bringing the dresses back to life and providing a second perspective on their functions.

Van Herpen’s reorientation underscores the egocentrism of the human race, with our fixation on things of our own size, in our near vision, and on the most familiar and easily observed processes. Likewise, we often ignore the labors of others even within our species. Inside our own bodies, operations constantly persist to sustain life in our circulatory, digestive, and nervous systems. And each of us, in our minds, has innumerable new and ever-evolving worlds. Van Herpen’s designs make the invisible visible, reminding us of the complex, interlinked, and essential beauty that surrounds us, big and small, near and far. One series at a time, they impress through their novelty and eccentricity; seen in aggregate, as in Sculpting the Senses, we get a sense of awe, an almost life-affirming quality.

Van Herpen’s boundless curiosity—her ongoing discovery of untapped sources of inspiration—complicates her stated goal of finding harmony in chaos. Although she succeeds at this in many individual dresses, the show’s increasing diversity in color, form, and source hardly feels harmonious in aggregate. But, in this multiplicity, we can easily find comfort in our place in the interconnectedness and infinite beauty of the universe, inspiring a sense of wonder about what is still to learn.

Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses is on view through December 6 at the Brooklyn Museum, 200 Eastern Parkway, Brooklyn