{"product_id":"what-the-dresses-know-a-womens-history-of-modernism-told-through-clothes-sophie-oliver","title":"What the dresses know. A women's history of modernism told through clothes. - Sophie Oliver","description":"\u003cp\u003eAn exciting new history of modernism that re-examines the movement through some of its most brilliant female artists.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePioneering women were at the heart of the movement known as modernism. In What the dresses know, Sophie Oliver offers a new account of their radical experiments and extraordinary lives, told through the clothes they made and wore.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom a dress Vanessa Bell rescued from the London Blitz to Frida Kahlo's huipiles and a waistcoat embroidered for Gertrude Stein by Alice B. Toklas, these special objects tell a story of artists seeking transformation. But getting dressed is rarely straightforward. Modernist women used clothes to think through the contradictions of the modern world: the inequalities of industrialisation, the terrible conformities demanded by fascism and racism and the call of feminists, socialists and avant-gardists to act differently and take up new forms of art.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cem\u003eWhat the dresses know\u003c\/em\u003e is an exhilarating account of women's bold attempts to make history during years of tumultuous change. A distinctive new voice in cultural criticism, Sophie Oliver uses clothes to explore the challenges modernist women faced - and to understand her own impulses in writing about them.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eManchester University Press, 2026\u003cbr\u003eHardcover, 368pp \u003cbr\u003e216 x 138mm \u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Tenderbooks","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":65028345561465,"sku":null,"price":20.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0488\/8029\/files\/Tenderbooks_09106c5e-9599-4dd7-98a1-ecf2b7ba2bdf.jpg?v=1793201604","url":"https:\/\/tenderbooks.co.uk\/products\/what-the-dresses-know-a-womens-history-of-modernism-told-through-clothes-sophie-oliver","provider":"Tenderbooks","version":"1.0","type":"link"}