Laure Julien, our GFC alumna who is currently residing in Niigata for an artist in residency program will be holding an exhibition of the artworks that she developed during her residency. The exhibition will be from June 21st to 28th at Yui Port Niigata.
Laure specialises in bamboo artworks, and will be presenting works in collaboration with artist Ayaka Uchiyama Vergain for this exhibition. More about Laure’s activities can be found here.
On January 7th, Laure Julien, who did her double degree at our GFC course in 2020, visited the university to talk about her multiple professional experiences as an independent artist after her time at our course.
During her exchange at GFC, Laure decided to extend her time in Japan for one year, to intern with the brand Eatable of many orders (Atami, Japan), between 2021 and 2022, and apprentice with bamboo master Tanaka Kyokusho in 2022. While in Atami, she also participated in an artist-in-residence program that allowed her to develop and present a performance project with a butoh dancer dressed in silk and bamboo, inspired by the princess Kaguya. After her time in Japan, she returned to Paris to finish her education at ENSAD, where she developed a graduate collection of sculptures in bamboo and leather in 2023.
After graduation, she has been active as an independent artist, and participated in a residence project at Casa de Velázquez, Madrid, Spain, to study esparto weaving in 2024, and continued studying palm, bull rush, and soft rush weaving in Portugal during the same year. While participating in these apprenticeships and residence programs, she organised and participated in multiple exhibitions featuring her works in France, Spain, and Japan.
She returned to Japan in January of this year with a cultural activity visa, to participate in two artist-in-residence programs: a MIRA artist in residence program in Beppu, Kyushu, where she will be working with bamboo artist Takayuki Shimizu; and a residency at YUI-PORT in Niigata.
Her experiences provided a valuable inspiration for our current students, and showed that even with limited Japanese language skills, it is possible to participate in internships, apprenticeships and artist-in-residency programs in Japan! We wish Laure all the best of luck in her upcoming endeavors!
Marcus Wilmont from the Royal Danish Academy held his second workshop series for our GFC students. This time, Marcus focused on practical in-studio exercises that explore shape generation from different perspectives. While doing so, Marcus encouraged the students to reflect on how we as fashion designers, perceive body standards and design for unreal bodies. This brought up discussions about inclusion and diversity of body types, gender, ethical or social backgrounds in the fashion system, and the role of the designer in creating alternative perspectives.
As a part of the class Japanese Art & Design, our first year students had the chance to visit some of the shows from the s/s 2025 Rakuten Fashion Week here in Tokyo last week. For this excursion, we invited ms. Takano Kumiko, who is a key figure for ACROSS, the trend observing association under PARCO, and who has been supporting our GFC course as a part-time lecturer from the start of the program for over ten years.
Thanks to ms. Takano, the students were able to view multiple shows, including TELMA, MITSURU OKAZAKI, SHINYA KOZUKA, the Global Fashion Collective and WILDFRÄULEIN. Furthermore, the students were also able to meet and discuss their research projects with Vogue Italia senior Editor and young designer talent scout Sara Maino. A precious opportunity, from which the students learnt a lot.
On April 8, 2024, we held a workshop organized by Marcus Wilmont, who teaches fashion design at the Royal Danish Academy – Architecture, Design, Conservation. He introduced existing dichotomies in fashion and discussed how designers have the responsibility to create alternative perspectives that address matters of inclusion and diversity concerning body types, age, gender, and ethnic or social backgrounds, among others.
Through the practical workshop, he demonstrated how designers can re-examine and explore the design development process in ways that allow them to develop new, alternative artistic narratives. While working on the mannequin, the students had the opportunity to design for their muse, a real person they know and have a relationship with.
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