Mondrian dress-paintings and Claude Lalanne jewels, the exhibition at Paris Musée Yves Saint-Laurent

The Musée Yves Saint-Laurent Paris is up to become a high place of fashion, exhibiting Saint-Laurent’s creations in his former studio! A year after its opening and two successful exhibitions, we’re offered a focus on two iconic collections of Yves Saint-Laurent from February 12, 2019 to December 31, 2019.

One of the main points of this display is the presentation of the collection of dresses inspired by painters Serge Poliakoff and Piet Mondrian from the Fall-Winter collection 1965 by Yves Saint-Laurent. Back in the days, the designer said: “Poliakoff and Mondrian brought me an extraordinary rejuvenation and refreshment: they taught me purity, banlance”. They mark the beginning of a great love story between Yves Saint-Laurent and both artists. After this collection, the designer pays tribute to Pablo Picasso’s major works of art, Vincent Van Gogh’s, Georges Braque’s, Henri Matisse’s, Fernand Léger’s and to the works of art of the sculpting brothers Claude and François-Xavier Lalanne.

Claude Lalanne meets Yves Saint-Laurent in the late 1950’s but it’s only a few years later that Saint-Laurent and Pierre Bergé really discover Claude Lalanne’s work. It’s during an exhibition at the Galerie J that the couple falls under Lalanne’s bestiary’s charm and order in 1965 a bar to François-Xavier Lalanne.

More than tributes to her work, Yves Saint-Laurent offers collaborations to Claude Lalanne from 1969. For her first contributions, the sculptor creates casts of the chest and stomach of one of the models. At that time, French newspaper Paris Match will write: “It’s not the body itself anymore, but the sculpted body that Yves Saint-Laurent dresses tend to highlight.”

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The same year, Yves Saint-Laurent will present a crazy knit bridal gown that was hand-knit with stiches in relief and knotted ribbons inspired by “matryoshkas”, these Russian dolls traditionally interlocking in one another. This dress will be displayed as well.

Besides, the most emblematic models of the Maison Yves Saint-Laurent such as tuxedo, safari jacket, jumpsuit, trench-coat to provide a vision of the now timeless wardrobe created by the designer.