Tino Casal, Art by Excess

The Madrid Costume Museum presents this fall one of its most ambitious projects, the exhibition Tino Casal, art by excess, an exhibition paying tribute to this Asturian artist (Celestino Casal, Tino / Tudela-Veguín, Asturias, 1950-Madrid, 1991 ) who shone in the 80s as a Spanish pop star. 

Tino Casal, excess art will show a small part of the legacy of this artist who was a singer, music producer, accessory and costume designer, stylist, decorator and set designer, painter and sculptor. This exhibition will highlight one aspect of this multifaceted artist that has surely been undervalued: his lavish outfit. At a time when many participated in the masquerade as an inseparable part of the transition culture, Casal took the challenge to its ultimate consequences. With him would come the scandal, a furious frivolity that demanded new airs, a different perspective on things. Twenty-five years after his premature disappearance, Tino Casal’s message is still valid. 

Tino Casal was a generous creator, who collaborated selflessly with musicians, filmmakers, photographers and designers, and became one of the icons of what was called the Movida madrileña. He was a precursor of styles, which he defended long before Spain was up to its aesthetic challenge. During the 80s, in addition to an exponential increase in ready-to-wear design firms, fashion underwent a process of expansion that led it to invade different spheres of society, both in the arts and in other cultural productions and industrial. The figure of Tino Casal exemplifies this amplification of the importance of the image well, finding in his case a compendium of influences that illustrates the cultural flows of postmodernity. 

Nearly 200 pieces can be seen in the sample, made up of about 50 sets, accessories, album covers, photographs and the work of Tino Casal, mostly from loans from his family. The tour is complemented by works by key artists in Casal’s career, such as Costus, Fabio MacNamara, Pablo Pérez-Mínguez and Miguel Trillo.