How We Turned Original Artwork Into a Living Runway Gallery at Bumbershoot

UNFRAMED started with a question we had been circling for years: what happens when the artwork refuses to stay on the wall?

When Alter Ego Expressions debuted the production at Bumbershoot Fashion District on September 5 and 6, 2026, the goal was to build a living gallery: a world where original artwork could leave the page, move through fabric, take on a body and become a character in real time.

Ayanna Ali simulates live painting onstage as models wearing custom garments featuring her artwork carry her vision beyond the canvas and onto the runway at Bumbershoot. Photo: Noah Kim (@nmk.jpg). Courtesy of Alter Ego Expressions.

The final production brought together 18 custom-fitted runway originals, five handmade theatrical masks, movement artists, oversized frames, live painting, original Alter Ego imagery, hair, makeup, sound and more than 30 creative contributors.

The scale changed quickly. Alter Ego expanded a two-garment starting point into an 18-look living gallery in four months, building not only the collection but the reveals, rehearsals and production system around it.

We started with the artwork, not the clothes

UNFRAMED grew from a simple question: what happens when artwork no longer has to stay inside a frame?

For years, Alter Ego has transformed Ayanna Ali's original character artwork into apparel, tapestries and art objects. The runway pushed that practice further. Sheer textiles became sculptural garments. Printed imagery was wrapped, layered, concealed and revealed across the body. Models were not asked to simply wear looks. They were coached to inhabit characters.

That is why every entrance changed the picture. Some looks relied on restraint and stillness. Others used volume, fringe, wings or sheer layers to alter the space around the wearer. Movement artists redirected the runway while the models shifted between direct walks and staged reveal moments.

Then we built a runway that behaved like a gallery

Gat prepares to emerge through the oversized central frame in the blue Wrapped Tunic Set during UNFRAMED. Photo: Chloe Collier (@hi_chloetry). Courtesy of Alter Ego Expressions.

Frames became more than set decoration. They represented containment, expectation and the traditional boundary between artwork and audience. Gat emerged through the large central frame before moving outward to assume his persona: the Midnight Celestial Sovereign. Other models revealed hidden elements within their looks, while movement artists continually reshaped the visual field around them.

At the center of the production, founder and creative director Ayanna Ali performed a staged painting sequence at a large canvas. The runway, the artwork and the performers were designed to feel like parts of the same ecosystem rather than separate departments competing for attention.

None of it could move without the people behind it

The collection reached the stage through the work of garment makers, models, movement artists, dressers, hair and makeup artists, production assistants, photographers, technical crew and collaborators. That collective labor mattered as much as the final silhouettes.

The post-show story of UNFRAMED is therefore not only about what appeared on the runway. It is about how sketches became textiles, how garments became characters and how a team of artists learned to move as one system.

The show ended. The world didn’t.

Bumbershoot was the debut, not the end of the project. Select UNFRAMED silhouettes are available for purchase as made-to-order custom pieces, allowing collectors and customers to carry parts of the runway world into their own wardrobes.

Alter Ego is also developing UNFRAMED for future cultural spaces and seeking presenting partners, sponsors and fiscal partners. That support would help compensate cast and crew, care for and transport the collection, adapt the production to new venues and document its next chapter.

Over the coming weeks, this journal will break down individual characters, garments, masks, beauty transformations and the people who helped build the production.

The frame broke. Now we get to look more closely at what escaped.