By Liz Hobday in Canberra

Remember when Princess Diana wore a Jenny Kee koala jumper, and made headlines around the world?

It was the 1980s – when the flamboyant colours and bold shapes of Kee and fellow designer Linda Jackson put Australian fashion on the map for the first time.

The fashion duo was so influential that even four decades on, cutting-edge labels such as Jordan Gogos and Romance Was Born collaborate with them, and reference their work in runway designs.

Kee and Jackson were thoroughly original, but a new exhibition at the National Gallery of Australia shows French artist and designer Sonia Delaunay (1885-1979) was an early inspiration for both women.

Ukrainian-born Delaunay (who was often overshadowed by her more famous husband, the painter Robert Delaunay) deployed bright colours and geometric patterns, but she was not content with painting only.

Delaunay also worked across textile, theatre and costume design, and pioneered the notion of clothing-as-art, according to NGA curator Simeran Maxwell.

Kee and Jackson never met Delaunay, but had seen reproductions and encountered her work first hand in Paris, said Maxwell, and it expanded their understanding of what art could be.

Through Kee’s newly established Flamingo Park clothing salon in Sydney’s Strand Arcade, she and Jackson began to make and sell designs that were bright, bold, and wholly Australian.

They were pushing the boundaries of fashion design, and with it, Australia’s understanding of itself.

“They were making a concerted effort to make being Australian less culturally cringey,” Maxwell explained.

“They didn’t know they were making history, they were just trying to do something different.”

In the exhibition titled Know My Name: Kee, Jackson and Delaunay, rarely-seen garments from the archives of both designers show the exuberant colours they were known for, as well as the vibrant, innovative knits that epitomised 1980s fashion.

These are on display alongside prints, drawings, textiles and costumes by Delaunay, with several of her abstract prints from the national collection restored for the exhibition, and on show for the first time.

Both Kee and Jackson have been involved with the development of the show, and Kee has a longstanding connection to the gallery in Canberra – she was invited to design a silk scarf to mark its opening in 1982.

The show is another instalment in the NGA’s Know My Name project, which seeks to promote the work of Australia’s women artists.

The free exhibition runs from Saturday.

AAP travelled to Canberra with the assistance of the National Gallery of Australia.