Dion Lee speaks of futurism. In the past and present, what is presents as the foundation of what he does as a fashion designer is uncategorically Australian. He melts an infusion of ripe and tangent forms of references that possesses him in a way that leads to generate forms that whilst on one hand questions feminine identity but also the purpose and meaning of embodying clothes.

Two pillar panelled mirrors lay near flush to the corner of a corridor wall. The close proximity of the reflective panels encased a repeating, slightly distorted spatial environment. In the actual collection’s landscape imprint, the final design is characterised with mosaic tabbed pattern. This device as deceptive to the eye also highlights Louise van der Vorst to appear as a quad-image. This two folded presentation, the viewer extracting the garment’s frontage but also make a tangent view of Louise’s eyes see how the worn garment perpetuates itself from an entirely different angle resulting in another emotional connection.

Australian photographer Stephen Ward has been known to suspend beauty in apparition from the use of light and shadow to capture both distance and intimacy. This tableau Ward created with Lee focally shot frames that suspend both time and movement. Lee viscerally imbued essences of movement and mobility and through the fabrics he ultilised such as jersey, wool and silk tulle they not constrict but display strength and discipline, much like the fine art of ballet.

But Lee hasn’t leaped forward arbitrarily to just show a concept of a new ballerina. Since his self-accomplished startup at his old Newtown townhouse in Sydney’s inner-west, the endless toiling (not even the onset of influenza or common cold could have kept him away in the studio with his one assistant) on the oversized cutting tables he carefully peered over laid strewn open pages. A huge influence on his hone ability as a designer foremost has been the keepsake of a Japanese methodology. He carefully manipulates the concept of a kimono that whilst western dressing follows strict sizing rules, it is the garment that dictates the body’s wearability. And before Lee’s prolific rise, the body dynamics and its fluidity was and central the purpose and protection of his own designed clothes.

Whilst the collection ensued a study of movement, it also emphasised lightness and discipline in both fabric and body. He displays masterful tailoring and dressmaking techniques in a front pleated crimson red bra and skirt combination. Likewise, there was lightness in his use of brushed ash grey suede with multiple front-pleating in a bucket trouser and symmetrical cut-outs from the back of a silver-zipped breast-halter. Lee inverted the roping of a corset made from jacquard fabric developed with Australian Wool Innovation in London as apart of a long sleeved body dress with flesh tones from the side body to hemline. The active tension between corsetery and ballet pushing against one another was both astute and discipline. Yet harmonious allowing us to visually see a beautifully crafted traditional ballerina bun, the history of Louise red-streaked hair. Lee also further extended his collection by evoking his signature tailoring in a white bodice slit collared shirt and a deconstructed black blazer.

The suspension of works and the inviting beauty within these crevasses owes much to the revolutionary works by Harold Edgerton, an MIT professor who captured photography with light strobes. So much too the singular conceptual installations of artists Ceal Floyer in her french aural installation in 2007 and the duplicate mirrors by Felix Gonzalez-Torres in 1991. Lee working alongside Stephan Ward manages to positively create a visual narrative that functions on levels even beyond the sequential frames of a film.