These artists are reimagining the face mask. Here’s how.

With whimsy and an eye toward global culture, a virtual museum show recasts the grim pandemic icon as an artistic canvas.

A virtual exhibition of more than 100 face masks from around the world includes “Butterfly People” by Indian designer Rahul Mishra. The butterflies, Mishra says, symbolize the artisans who turn his creative flights of fancy into wearable art.
Courtesy of Rahul Mishra

The virulence of COVID-19 has made the mask literally the face of the pandemic. In response, museums all over the world have been collecting masks and other pandemic-related apparel, showing them in virtual and actual exhibits.

Perhaps the most ambitious is the globe-ranging online exhibition, Clothing the Pandemic, produced by the International Council of Museums’ (ICOM) Costume Committee. The committee includes museum professionals associated with the fashion arts.

Lead curators Fahmida Suleman, Sarah Fee, and Alexandra Palmer of the Royal Ontario Museum reached out to 15 institutions to virtually ‘borrow’ and show masks from around the world. “They’re just masks, one singular, small object that before the pandemic was part of the uniform worn by health professionals,” says Palmer. “Now

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