Arty Appetite: Marie Antoinette Style at the V&A

Wrapped in pink and tied with a diamond ribbon, Marie Antoinette Style at the V&A South Kensington laces its chocolate box exhibition with deadly poignancy. An iconic name in political and fashion history alike, the last queen of France’s reputation has spanned from insensitive, hedonistic ruler to the figurehead of misunderstood girlhood. The exhibition, with its pastel walls and similarly hued selection of eighteenth-century court dresses might kid you into plumping it firmly within the bounds of kitsch confectionery — but make no mistake: this sugary treat is laced with cyanide.

That’s not to say the exhibit doesn’t play with a more innocent fantasy; a reconstructed Hall of Mirrors places visitors firmly in the realm of dreams from the start. In its reflective walls, flowers, stripes and feathered stitches dance on dresses which seem to stretch on to eternity. A murmuring soundtrack only reinforces the room’s music-box presentation, encouraging the same child-like reverie as a small plastic ballerina stuck in an everlasting pirouette. The copy of Duchess Hedvig Charlotta’s wedding dress, constructed from silver brocade silk and strikingly similar to Marie Antoinette’s own, is the gleaming diamond at its heart. 

Emerging from the crystal-studded hall of mirrors, Versailles steps back a little for the time being, pastel hues taking the place of mirrored walls. Visitors are guided through the queen’s jewellery cabinet, satirical illustrations and finally something of the young girl who was parcelled off to France from Austria. The stripped back curation only helps the exhibit’s contents to shine, dark purple walls allowing the diamonds their full effect. From open-work heart rings to embellished farmer’s props, the young queen’s pastoral fantasy world shines through.

But every dream has to end, and Marie Antoinette opts for a rather brutal wake up call. Large interactive pomanders shaped like busts hold different scents from the queen’s life — from the warm scent of candle wax at one of Versailles’ many balls, to her powdered wigs dusted with tuberose and orris root. Working your way through these sweetly nostalgic perfumes, it may come as something of a shock on reaching the final bust, its floating stand painted oxblood red, capturing the dank smells of her prison cell. It’s here the exhibit turns more confrontational. Despite the pastel pink walls, the heavier beats of the soundtrack in the next room creep through. Together with pre-recorded twinkling that plays out from behind one of Marie Antoinette’s seventeen pianos from Versailles, the playful spirit of the earlier rooms grows a little more restless here, forewarning of an end to the playful dreamworld of the previous displays. 

In the next room, this restlessness is made clear. Blushing pink gives way to a deep scarlet — the words of Marie Antoinette’s older sister Maria Carolina dragging visitors deeper even as it warns them away: “Everything that ends her torture is good.” A deeply affecting circlet of objects lies in wait: her final note, a memento embedded with hair which was gifted to her First Chambermaid, a simple chemise and a guillotine blade dated to the French Revolution. Shadowed and downwards lit, you could almost kid yourself the blade’s still dripping. Haunted by the words over the second door from the late queen proclaiming “Nothing can hurt me now” and the handwritten prayers for mercy that preceded her death, it’s a jarring return to excesses of fashion her legacy inspired. Here, Marie Antoinette’s legacy is memorialised for her influence on fantasy and fashion alike. Empress Eugenie’s nineteenth-century chiné dress plays with Marie Antoinette’s love of printed cotton and dresses bedecked in bows while illustrator Edmund Dulac memorialises her as the frosty Snow Queen from Hans Christian Anderson’s story of the same name. 

It’s in the final room, however, that the exhibit reaches the height of escapist fantasy. Met with photographs from Tim Walker and the pounding beat of a modern catwalk show, you can forget, for a second, the blade suspended in the room next door. Versailles has come to South Kensington. Abstract rocky structures frame Marie Antoinette’s fashionable legacy, centred on Galliano’s Marquise Masquée gown from Dior’s 1998 Spring collection. Floating on a pool of reflective blue, the court of the Sun King seems to have settled in seamlessly at the V&A. Marie Antoinette’s Folly by artist Beth Katleman suspends china white sculptures, mirrors and flaking flowers across one navy blue wall — a Toile de Jouy-like scene in porcelain charting the downfall of the queen. Between Manolo Blahnik’s collection of shoes from Sofia Coppola’s infamous biopic and Moschino’s 2020/21 collection of sculptural cake dresses, it can be hard to know where to look. 

Through the chaos and the illusions and the excess, at its heart Marie Antoinette Style never forgets the girl at its centre. Her influence feels most joyful, most settled, here in the twenty-first-century in a set reminiscent of the outdoor ballroom at Versailles. Both thoroughly of her time and thoroughly modern, Marie Antoinette sums it up best: “We have dreamt a pleasant dream, that is all.” This dream within a dream is sure to have visitors wishing they’ll never wake up.