Olympic gold medalist and fashion designer, Li-Ning, presented his Autumn/Winter 2020 during Paris Fashion Week on January 18, 2020. The Runway show also honored the Li-Ning brand’s 30th anniversary which sets into motion a far-reaching series of new collaborations and associations within the worlds of fashion and contemporary art. This unique partnership includes Li-Ning’s three-year patronage, beginning in January 2020, of Paris’ renowned cultural institution the Centre Pompidou.
For the show, Li-Ning creates the effect of a shifting 3-D urban landscape—the Pompidou illuminated in a matrix-like grid constructed of scaffolding, neon, pixelated LED screens, and monitors displaying 8-bit content reminiscent of ’80s video games along side various vintage video footage. The games and videos play, glitch, and “break down” then loop again, highlighting the season’s innate clash between lo-fi and hi-fi.
Guests at the Runway show included Jackie Chan, Mr. Li Ning, Dwyane Wade, Gabrielle Union, Stefano Pilati, MJ Harper, and Honey Dijon took in this epic display, in which models walked the Pompidou to a roughly collaged soundtrack that flickered between underground dance music, new wave hits, and ambient sounds of city bustling streets.
