This feature is in our March '23 "Next Wave" Issue. Click here to subscribe.

“When I think of handbags, one of the first things that comes to mind is the Lady Dior bag,” says artist Alex Gardner (@artposer). The California-based figurative artist is one of 11 global artists for this year’s Dior Lady Art collaboration (dior.com).

Dior Lady Art Limited Edition bag in Collaboration with Alex Gardner, available at select Dior boutiques nationwide PHOTO © HARRY EELMAN/COURTESY OF BRAND

Gardner’s work is both intimate and expansive, allowing each viewer to connect to his art in a personal way.

Lady Dior bag in embossed metallized silver calfskin and black velvet. Jewelry in silver finish metal. Dior Lady Art Limited Edition bag in Collaboration with Alex Gardner, available at select Dior boutiques nationwide PHOTO © HARRY EELMAN/COURTESY OF BRAND

“We used a painting I made,” he says of his collaboration to reimagine Dior’s iconic Lady Dior bag using a blend of materials. “The work that I’m referencing here is a painting titled ‘Malleability.’ It’s a hand kind of pressing down on just an ambiguous part of another figure. And I was just kind of thinking about how easy it is to manipulate and get in the heads and control actions of people,” Gardner says.

The interior of Gardner’s Lady Dior is dressed in a flamboyant red, “the color of life,” as Monsieur Dior used to say PHOTO © HARRY EELMAN/COURTESY OF BRAND

A magical melange of materials, the holographic leather of the bag contrasts with the supermatte black velvet, and renders the artist’s figurative and surreal work in three dimensions. “We chose a holographic leather that’s very shiny, reflective, to emulate the cloth in the paintings,” the artist explains.

Artist Alex Gardner PHOTO © HARRY EELMAN/COURTESY OF BRAND

As a wearable form of art, Gardner’s Lady Dior offers a pensive exploration of identity, influence and the beauty of the everyday. “Fashion, for example, has a lot of influence on culture. And then if, you know, people, they get their hands on the bag, it’s like the influence they may feel they have on the room or something when they walk in, right?”

The bag features holographic leather and supermatte black velvet that reimagines the artist’s work “Malleability.” PHOTO © HARRY EELMAN/COURTESY OF BRAND

Consider us influenced, indeed.

PHOTO © HARRY EELMAN/COURTESY OF BRAND