Parodi Costume Collection

Education is the primary mission at Parodi Costume Collection and Parodi Costume Institute. We like to think of education as predicated through interactivity, and community building around multi-disciplinary engagement. When the programming behind In Praise of Ma was structured, we looked to complement the exhibition’s conceptual thread with the cultural context around the featured Japanese designers. For opening week, PCC/PCI invited a Zen Samurai to perform a collaborative poetic work in and outside the gallery space, to be followed by a collaborative performance with contemporary artist Max Guevara Max Guevara
 
Sixteenth in his line, Sensei Zen Takai THE ZEN SAMURAI is dedicated to the preservation of the Zen Samurai culture and arts, while sharing his wisdom with contemporary society.
 
As part of the calligraphy performance, Sensei Zen Takai inhabited the exhibition space, meditating alongside the garments while reflecting on the concept of Ma. This meditative process feeds his work to create “an unrepeatable expression of energy that belongs only to the moment of its creation and the space it will inhabit.” The calligraphy produced, currently displayed in the exhibition gallery, is an equal balance of white space and its kanji, a poetic representation Ma made immediately following his mediation.

Sensei Zen Takai’s work it is on view within the exhibition In Praise of Ma; Emptinees and the Space Within, which is now closed to the general public.

Visits are available by appointment only for private events, educational groups, and large parties until august 2026.

For inquiries and reservations, please contact [email protected].

Text by Sofia Sidelnik 🕊

Sequence by Jesus Pineda Jesus

In In Praise of Shadows (1933), Junichiro Tanizaki reflects on Japan’s rapid shift toward Western modernity in the early 20th century, and the ways in which this transformation altered traditional sensibilities rooted in Shinto and Buddhist ideology. Electric light replaced shadow, concrete replaced wood, and everyday life increasingly moved toward clarity, efficiency, and exposure. For Tanizaki, this shift risked erasing a more subtle and nuanced way of experiencing space, one grounded in ambiguity, depth, and atmosphere.

Our current exhibition, pays homage to Tanizaki by extending his thesis into space, and consequentially to fashion design. In this tribute a Shoji screen becomes a veil concealing a garment; an object encountered only as shadow before being revealed. This gesture evokes the aesthetic hi (秘), a form of concealment that awakens curiosity through what is withheld. This installation features a CDG S/S 1997 Body Meets Dress, Dress Meets Body dress, displayed on a full-body mannequin behind the three-panel Shoji screen. Lit from behind, the garment appears initially only as a distorted silhouette. As viewers move around the screen, the dress is gradually revealed, shifting perception from speculation to encounter.

The exhibition starts with Issey Miyake’s 1998 Gunpowder Dress S/S concealed at the entrance, visible only as a shadow before access into the center hall. In the main gallery, another Kawakubo work is positioned within a zen garden, topped by a wool wig, casting shifting and organic shadows that change with movement and light. Across the exhibition, garments are in continual flow, activated through shadow—subtle, intentional.

Together, these installations extend Tanizaki’s philosophy into spatial form. As the exhibition comes to an end, we return to Tanizaki’s reflection that “The quality that we call beauty… must always grow from the realities of life.” In Praise of Ma articulates beauty not as something fixed, staged, manufactured, or revealed all at once, but as phenomena unfolding and discovered, embedded with the flow of real experience, distressed with the passage of time,always emerging through the interplay of shadow and space

As an incubator for methodologies in fashion curation, PCC and PCI continually engage and incorporate artists into narratives that represent new ways to look and think about fashion history. Inspired by Rei Kawakubo’s runway looks and wig sculptor, Julian dYs’ work, PCC-PCI curatorial looked to recreate a wig from the Spring/Summer 2009 Comme Des Garçons runway. Through community engagement—they recruited Briana Angulo Madueño, a Miami based sculptor and performance artist, to pay tribute to Kawakubo-dYs work while embracing the concepts presented in .
 
Within the  exhibition “In Praise of Ma: Emptiness and the Space Within,” there is an object that simultaneously disrupts the pause and simplicity of the space while embracing the aesthetic of raw textures. Angulo Madueño’s wig is the focal point of a distinct volume rising from a Zen garden, capping a half-mannequin wearing a Comme Des Garçon 2014 Fall/Winter garment.  
 
To learn more about our process and collaboration with Briana in an intimate interview with PCC-PCI’s team, read our new substack article in the link in Bio.







Wig Artist : .m

Text and Photography by : Jessica Hayek  

Image Sequence:

Texture of recreated wig by Briana Angulo-Madueño. Image by Jessica Hayek

Texture of recreated wig by Briana Angulo-Madueño. Image by Jessica Hayek

Portrait of Briana Angulo-Madueño. Image by Jessica Hayek

Comme Des Garcons 2014 Fall/Winter Dress within Zen Garden. Image by Jessica Hayek

Polaroids of Briana Angulo-Madueño working on wig cap.

Comme Des Garcons 2014 Fall/Winter Dress within Zen Garden. Image by Jessica Hayek

Comme Des Garcons 2014 Fall/Winter Dress within Zen Garden Polaroid

Briana Angulo-Madueño along with recreated Julian dYs wig. Image by Jessica Hayek

For the past year, PCC has embarked on the challenge of digitizing its complete collection. This long process ensures accountability of objects, immediacy of information, and allows our team a one-on-one with each object in our collection. The creation of a digital Catalogue Raisonne  is essential to the process of archiving, facilitating future direction, research, programming and conservation. 
 
The inventory process is made up of multiple steps that ensure the best care and conservation practices for the objects, while structuring a robust database that facilitates ongoing research and future narratives. 
 
Digitization begins with high definition photography of each object, allocation of an accession number, a formal written description, and any information on producer and provenance. Every piece at PCC is delicately handled, with minimal manipulation, and photographed flat in order to preserve condition. A large scale professional photography lab was developed for this ongoing project, including lighting equipment, camera tethering, and neutral backdrops for every garment, accessory, fabric, and document. This digital photography Lab has  two working stations- one dedicated solely to garments and another for accessories and smaller objects. As the images are captured, the PCC conservation team conducts an overall condition report, noting any need  for conservation or restoration. Every single notation is uploaded to the catalogue database.
 
All research and object details go into an extensive spreadsheet whose data is imported into a professional Museum Collections Management System. This system is the brain where all information and research on each object is gathered, facilitating and expediting our search by designer, era, year, material, color, and many more data fields.
 
Once digitization completed, the process continues. Every garment, accessory or artifact gets packed away in acid free museum conservation materials, and placed in its allocated storage unit/space at the museum. Due to the unpredictable climate  and humidity conditions in South Florida, correct packing and storing of historical objects is vital to their continued stability.

The Parodi Costume Collection, and The Parodi Costume Institute Foundation are pleased to announce the extension of In Praise of Ma: Emptiness and the Space Within, through June 12th, 2026.

Since its opening, the exhibition has welcomed an incredible community of visitors—from  a Zen Master Poet, to fashion students and enthusiasts, curators, designers, artists, to the Consul General of Japan and his team, SCAD President Paula Wallace and the entire SCAD FASH Community, our dear friends and professors from MDC MFI and Istituto Marangoni Miami, and many more. The series of visitor Polaroids we present in this post captures moments from these encounters, reflecting the many perspectives that have shaped the life of this show. We are deeply grateful for the continued engagement and support.
 
In Praise of Ma: Emptiness and the Sapce Within explores a radical shift in fashion initiated by Rei Kawakubo, Issey Miyake, and Yohji Yamamoto. Grounded in the aesthetic principles of Ma (間), Hi (秘), So (素), and Ha (破), the exhibition presents garments within immersive installations inspired by East Asian culture and Zen Buddhism—inviting a new way of experiencing fashion through space, materiality, and relationship.

This extension offers additional time to visit before we close for the summer.
 
On view through June 12, 2026
By appointment only at www.parodicostumecollection.com (link in bio)

 

FASH

In Praise of Ma: Emptiness and The Space Within, an exhibition that spotlights the radical shift in fashion initiated in the early 1980’s by Rei Kawakubo, Issey Miyake and Yohji Yamamoto, is a progressive experiment in fashion curation, one that presents fashion design as acts of philosophical reflection and meditation.
 
Parodi Costume Collection is honored to share recent stories from prestigious publications worldwide.
 
Our gratitude and appreciation to 🌎 Miami Climate 365

Photography by Zachary Balber
 
In Praise of Ma: Emptiness and The Space Within on view until May 2026
By appointment only at www.parodicostumecollection.com (link in bio).