TOM WATSON & OLENA MYLENKO

June 19 - September 21, 2025 l Brussels, BELGIUM

THE EYE OF FASHION

Fashion and photography crossed paths forever in the preamble to contemporaneity, representing another aesthetic level within art, a discipline that swings between two new desires: the personal image and its public projection. This is why the contemporary phenomenon of fashion is born with photography and its capacity for seduction, communication, contextualisation and recurrent updating of dreams, ambitions and emotions. A phenomenon that functions as the great visual archive of our socio-cultural metamorphosis.

In this context, Tom Watson's work represents a unique value, a driving force behind a lively, chromatic and stimulating iconography. The beauty of his photography lies in an inexhaustible narrative expressiveness, made up of multiple stories, in the transcription of momentum as a force that activates the imagination and directly connects the eye with the story, fantasising with the complicity of the spectator. Each story told aspires to sublimate the singular transience of a moment. The success and transcendence of his work has materialised in collaborations with historic publications such as Harper's Bazaar, Cosmopolitan and Vanity Fair, as well as international brands such as Cerruti, Trussardi and Desigual, among others. Beyond occupying a place among the great names in fashion photography, Watson is the creator of a unique style that encompasses all categories, establishing himself as a master of this total art.

Along with photography, illustration is the other source that provides visual narratives in this context of beauty and spectacularity. Illustration and design are indissoluble in nature, a stimulating union that emerges directly from the sphere of ideas. The artist Olena Mylenko thus completes the dialogue between two primordial ways of conceiving and telling fashion on paper, transmitting not only creative proposals but a whole imaginary. Through the scenes of fashion shows, poses and profiles, her watercolour drawings capture the drama of the movements, the richness of the textiles, shapes and details, while aesthetically connecting with the tradition of the figurines, resources of enormous symbolism, icons for the recreation of a dream.

Both artists constitute the creative breath, a nexus between fantasy and society and above all, as in the present exhibition, they are the eye that projects the visual heritage of fashion.

Reyes Abad Flores

ABOUT TOM WATSON

ABOUT OLENA MYNENKO

Olena Mynenko (Ukraine, 1970) is a visual artist who reinvents the genre of contemporary landscape art, transforming the landscape into a symbolic stage for processes of social, political, and ecological change. Trained in Fine Arts in Kyiv and in fashion design in Barcelona, Mynenko has developed an international career that combines technical precision with a critical eye on power structures and cycles of historical transformation. Her recent work experiments with various media —such as wood, canvas, and paper— exploring the expressive potential of chiaroscuro, texture, and volume. Through meticulous black-and-white work, and with a sensitivity rooted in the European academic drawing tradition, she creates scenes that intertwine nature, mythology, and contemporary reflection. Over the course of her career, she has exhibited in numerous countries, including Belgium, Sweden, the Netherlands, South Africa, Spain, and the United Kingdom, participating in both solo and group exhibitions, as well as in artistic collaborations with brands such as Hermès and Cartier. Since 2022, following the outbreak of war in Ukraine, she has intensified the social dimension of her work by collaborating with cultural initiatives and creating posters and visual content for solidarity campaigns.

EXHIBITIONS AND COLLABORATIONS

• June – August 2025 – Solo exhibition “Los días del primer sol”, Casa América, Madrid, Spain.

• November – December 2024 – Collective Exhibition, Gallery Sjöhästen, Nyköping, Sweden.

• September 2024 – Musical Illusions (Hybrid Art and Music Exhibition), Gallery at the Canal, The Hague, Netherlands.

• July – August 2024 – Collective Exhibition, Galleri Stenhallen, Öland, Sweden.

• April – May 2024 – From Floor to Floor (Solo Exhibition with Stefano Moras), Open Earth Foundation, Brussels, Belgium.

• October – November 2023 – Collective Exhibition, Grupo Pro Arte y Cultura, Limburg Stirum Collection, Château de Huldenberg, Brussels, Belgium.

• July 2023 – Songs of Freedom (Collective Exhibition), Gallery Arttelex, Antwerp, Belgium.

• October 2022 – Under Sheltered Skies (Collective Exhibition), Ukrainian Cultural Center “Ukrainian Voices,” Brussels, Belgium.

• January 2021 – January 2022 – South African Series (Permanent Collective Exhibition), Gallery Baltasar, Place du Petit Sablon, Brussels, Belgium.

• January 2021 – January 2023 – Ephemeral Installations, La Papeterie Anglaise, Avenue Louise 41, Brussels, Belgium.

• October 2021 – Live Fashion Sketches (Art Live Performance), Commissioned by Hermès, Luxembourg.

• May 2020 – Cartier over the Rainbow (Online Exhibition), Charity for British NHS, Cartier, London, UK.

• December 2019 – South African Nature Legacy (Collective Exhibition), Hout Bay City Council, Cape Town, South Africa.

• November 2018 – Live Fashion Sketches (Art Live Performance), Commissioned by Hermès, Rijks Restaurant, Amsterdam, Netherlands.

• October 2017 – Live Fashion Sketches (Art Live Performance), Commissioned by Hermès, Hermès Boutique, Luxembourg.

• June 2017 – Live Fashion Sketches (Art Live Performance), Commissioned by Hermès, Hof Van Cleve, Kruishoutem, East Flanders, Belgium.

• 2016 – Kate Moss Series, Collaboration with Charles Lobkowicz.

• 2016 – Christmas Gourmet Catalogue, Embassy Madrid.