Gary Graham - Extracting Ghosts

Gary Graham is an American fashion designer and artist. He founded his eponymous women’s wear line in New York City in 1999, gaining notice for its exquisite detailing, fine craftsmanship, and historical erudition. For twenty years, his designs were sold at his Tribeca retail flagship store and through luxury retailers worldwide. He now produces small-batch collections in his rural upstate New York studio under the moniker GaryGraham422, drawing inspiration from historical figures and antique textiles to create visionary 21st-century fashion.

Alongside his design work, he maintains a robust artistic practice. Working with institutions such as the Old Manse, Hancock Shaker Village, the Rhode Island School of Design Museum, Peabody Essex Museum, and the American Folk Art Museum, Graham has created installations, clothing collections, drawings, and sculpture inspired by these sites’ histories, architecture, and curated objects. His talk, Extracting Ghosts, will focus on his research-based, site-specific work.

He has collaborated with artists such as Kara Walker (costume design for her 2024 – 2026 installation Fortuna and the Immortality Garden (Machine), currently on view at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art) and Meredith Monk (the 2015 sound installation The Conversation at the Peabody Essex Museum). His work is held in the permanent collections of the Peabody Essex Museum, the American Folk Art Museum, the Phoenix Art Museum, and the Rhode Island School of Design Museum. In his only foray into reality TV, he was a finalist on season two of the Amazon fashion design competition series Making the Cut.

Graham earned a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and is a member of the Council of Fashion Designers of America. He currently holds a teaching position in the Textiles Department at the Rhode Island School of Design.

With support from Design Core Detroit.

This project was made possible by a grant from the Arts Initiative at the University of Michigan.

Series presenting partners: Detroit PBS, ALL ARTS, and PBS Books. Media partner: Michigan Public.

Host or Publisher Penny Stamps Distinguished Speaker Series - University of Michigan