Resounding with the influence of Italy's legendary avant-garde artists, Ian Griffiths' collection was rife with surprising textures and refreshingly redesigned coats.

Fashion is perpetually entwined in a waltz with art. Perhaps&nbsp;the designer who is most attuned to that dance at the moment is Raf Simons, whose plethora of <a href="https://www.lofficielsingapore.com/fashion/calvin-klein-the-andy-warhol-foundation-partnership">art-inspired creations&nbsp;for Calvin Klein</a> now counts yet another <a href="https://www.lofficielsingapore.com/fashion/calvin-klein-jeans-andy-warhol-self-portraits-capsule-collection-t-shirts-hoodies-jeans-bags">Warhol-printed collection</a>. A worthy contender would be Gucci&#39;s Alessandro Michele, whose artistic&nbsp;collaborations have spawned <a href="https://www.lofficielsingapore.com/fashion/gucci-launches-chinese-new-year-dog-themed-collection-2018-unskilled-worker">several</a>&nbsp;<a href="https://www.lofficielsingapore.com/fashion/gucci-launches-capsule-collection-with-spanish-artist-coco-capitan-tshirts-sweatshirts-bags">Instagram-worthy</a> <a href="https://www.lofficielsingapore.com/fashion/gucci-launches-new-limited-edition-guccihallucination-capsule-collection-online">collections</a>, or Dior&#39;s Maria Grazia Chiuri, whose creative approach involves referencing the works of <a href="https://www.lofficielsingapore.com/fashion-week/dior-spring-summer-2018-runway-collection-paris-fashion-week">female</a> <a href="https://www.lofficielsingapore.com/fashion/jennifer-lawrence-goes-androgynous-for-dior-fall-2018-campaign">artists</a>.&nbsp;With his Resort 2019 collection for Max Mara, creative director Ian Griffiths&nbsp;officially put on his dancing shoes and swayed to a similar rhythm.&nbsp;

The collection was an homage to Max Mara's art-collecting founder.

Griffiths chose to hold the show&nbsp;at the Collezione Maramotti in&nbsp;Reggio Emilia,&nbsp;the building that served as Max Mara&#39;s&nbsp;first headquarters and now houses founder&nbsp;Achille Maramotti&#39;s private&nbsp;art collection.&nbsp;As a tribute to Maramotti, Griffiths&#39; collection was inspired by the artworks&nbsp;in the gallery, which&nbsp;boasts a roster of avant-garde Italian artists&nbsp;such as Piero Manzoni, Lucio Fontana, Alberto Burri and&nbsp;Giovanni Anselmo. The result was a&nbsp;range of elegant coats and eveningwear pieces that echoed with a&nbsp;distinctive artistic influence,&nbsp;starting with the colours.

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Throughout the collection, the neutral tones&nbsp;of&nbsp;white, grey and black&nbsp;mingled with the chalky hues of&nbsp;Pietro Novelli&#39;s Baroque paintings, including&nbsp;ultramarine, viridian and lemon. Some tailored suits even came in the shade of raw canvas. Other than nodding&nbsp;to&nbsp;the collection&#39;s influences, the muted colours&nbsp;also served another purpose: to highlight the thoughtful design details of the clothes.

The garments had a painter's palette.

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Patchworks, plaits, sculptural ruches, twists, knots&nbsp;&mdash; the whole works were on display on this season&#39;s pants, bodices and blouses. They weren&#39;t random either; the intricate details of the collection were pulled straight from the textured works of Burri and Anselmo, attesting to Griffiths&#39; observant&nbsp;eye for detail.

Texture was everything...

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You couldn&#39;t miss them; almost every other model was lugging one of the collection&#39;s&nbsp;crinkly pliss&eacute; leather bags in their arms as&nbsp;they walked down the runway. Griffiths has Piero Manzoni&#39;s&nbsp;Achrome artwork series to thank for the unusual texture of the bags, which in our opinion make&nbsp;for&nbsp;some of this season&#39;s most distinctive offerings yet.

... especially for the bags.

Scripts were stripped of their meaning and used to decorate dresses, sweaters pants, resulting in a sort of antithesis to the logos that currently pervade the runways.&nbsp;By taking cues from the works of Cy&nbsp;Twombly and&nbsp;Jannis Kounellis, Griffiths created an&nbsp;array of calligraphic prints that stand&nbsp;out against the otherwise bare-surfaced collection.

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Max Mara has always been known for its exquisite outerwear, and this season was no different. There&nbsp;were reversible coats &mdash;&nbsp;cashmere on one side, textured nylon on the other &mdash; and masculine overcoats made of silk organza, but the most noteworthy of all were Griffith&#39;s reworkings&nbsp;of the brand&#39;s signature garment, the <a href="https://www.lofficielsingapore.com/fashion/inside-max-mara-coats!-2017-exhibition-in-seoul-dongdaemun-design-plaza">camel coat</a>. Presented in a black version for the opening look and a white one for the closing look, Griffiths&#39; update to the&nbsp;101801 coat featured sliced sleeves, allowing it to be worn as an elegant cape&nbsp;instead.

Max Mara Resort 2019: An Artistic Tribute

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