How WEEKEND MAX MARA Brings Contemporary Artists Into The Language Of The Trench Coat
written LE MILE
For Spring/Summer 2026, WEEKEND MAX MARA expands its ongoing “Signature” capsule initiative with A Weekend with an Artist, a project that places contemporary artists at the center of the design process. The collection focuses on a single garment — the trench coat — and invites five internationally recognized artists to reinterpret the house’s Canasta trench as an individual artwork. The artists involved are Victoria Kosheleva, Paola Pivi, Tschabalala Self, Tai Shani, and Shafei Xia.
Their contributions form a small series of artist-designed pieces presented within the WEEKEND MAX MARA collection. The project was curated by art critic and curator Francesco Bonami, whose career includes directing the Venice Biennale, curating the Whitney Biennial, and serving as artistic director of BYArtmatters in Hangzhou. The collaboration reflects a long-standing relationship between fashion and contemporary art, one that has repeatedly reshaped the cultural position of clothing. Since the late twentieth century, fashion houses have increasingly invited artists into their design processes. The reasons vary, visual experimentation, cultural relevance, and the possibility of placing garments within a wider artistic conversation. Projects of this type also blur the boundaries between exhibition culture and fashion production. Garments circulate in retail spaces and on bodies, while simultaneously operating as artworks or limited objects shaped by artistic authorship.
The Max Mara project builds on this tradition by focusing on a single archetypal garment. The trench coat functions here as both product and canvas. Bonami describes the aim as offering “through an iconic garment, the opportunity for individual and personal expression.” The selection of artists follows curatorial logic. Distinct visual languages, generational diversity, and independence from market trends were central to the choice of participants.
WEEKEND MAX MARA SS26 Signature Collection
A Weekend With An Artist, Tai Shani
WEEKEND MAX MARA SS26 Signature Collection
A Weekend With An Artist, Tai Shani
Each artist approaches the trench through their existing artistic vocabulary. Russian artist Victoria Kosheleva worked directly on a prototype coat, painting motifs that later became the basis for printed reproductions. Her visual language merges contemporary imagery with references to classical painting, a direction she has described as “cyber expressionism.” For the trench project she imagined the garment as a theatrical surface. Checkerboard patterns, swirling lines, flowers, and a stylized eye spread across the coat, producing an image that resembles stage costume design as much as clothing.
Italian artist Paola Pivi, known for installations that reframe everyday objects, introduced a palette influenced by the light and color of Hawaii, where she currently lives. Vertical rainbow stripes run across the coat, narrowing toward the waist and creating an hourglass structure. The pattern references the double rainbows frequently visible in the island’s sky, translating a natural optical phenomenon into a garment surface.
Tschabalala Self approaches the trench through her ongoing exploration of identity and symbolism. Born in Harlem, Self works across painting, sculpture, and installation. Her trench coat appears in lacquered pastel yellow and carries her recurring “Infinity Flower” motif. The flower refers to cyclical growth and transformation. The pattern is applied through a stamping technique inspired by batik dyeing processes, introducing a craft reference into the garment’s production.
British artist Tai Shani brings a different aesthetic register. Her multidisciplinary practice spans film, performance, writing, and installation, often exploring feminist histories and collective structures. For the collection she designed a glossy black vinyl trench decorated with hand-drawn cat illustrations. The imagery references mid-century pin-up iconography while playing with the trench coat’s cultural associations with secrecy and disguise.
WEEKEND MAX MARA SS26 Signature Collection
A Weekend With An Artist, Shafei Xia
The youngest artist in the project, Bologna-based Chinese painter Shafei Xia, contributes a watercolor composition originally painted on sandalwood paper. Her image shows a woman merging with a white tiger, surrounded by floral forms that spread across the coat’s back. Xia’s work often draws on historical East Asian erotic painting traditions while incorporating references to European art figures such as Luigi Ontani. The trench translates this visual narrative into a wearable surface.
The campaign accompanying the project was photographed by Petra Collins, an artist and director whose photographic work helped define the visual language of the 2010s. Collins appears in the images herself, wearing the five trench coats in a studio environment that resembles a storage warehouse filled with artworks. The setting positions the garments within an exhibition-like space, reinforcing their identity as art objects as much as clothing pieces. Artist collaborations of this kind continue a broader pattern within fashion history. Yves Saint Laurent’s Mondrian dresses of 1965 translated modernist painting into couture construction. Louis Vuitton’s partnerships with Takashi Murakami and Yayoi Kusama transformed accessories into mobile artworks. Prada has long worked with artists and architects across installations and runway environments. These examples demonstrate how art collaborations can operate as genuine exchanges when artists maintain their visual language rather than adapting to brand aesthetics.
WEEKEND MAX MARA SS26 Signature Collection
A Weekend With An Artist, Paola Pivi
WEEKEND MAX MARA SS26 Signature Collection
A Weekend With An Artist, Tschabalala Self
WEEKEND MAX MARA SS26 Signature Collection
A Weekend With An Artist, Shafei Xia
Projects like A Weekend with an Artist sit within this lineage, they highlight how garments can function as cultural surfaces where artistic practice and fashion design intersect. In this context, the trench coat becomes more than an outerwear staple. It carries the visual vocabulary of five different artists, each using the same garment to explore form, symbolism, or narrative. A small series of wearable works moves between fashion production, artistic authorship, and collector culture, positioning clothing simultaneously as design object and artistic medium.
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WEEKEND MAX MARA SS26