“Yves Saint Laurent: The Style is Eternal” at The Bowes Museum
The first exhibition on Yves Saint Laurent to be held in the UK, it highlights the everlasting influence Laurent have on fashion and womenswear.
Yves Saint Laurent. Haute couture collection Fall Winter 1970. Marina Schiano wearing the short evening dress © The Estate of Jeanloup Sieff . All rights reserved
Created in collaboration with Foundation Pierre Bergé – Yves Saint Laurent, the Bowes Museum’s exhibition “Yves Saint Laurent: The Style is Eternal” explores the work of the French designer through a comprehensive collection of pieces installed amongst the Museum’s own collection.
It was in 1962, just after being the Artistic Director of Maison Christian Dior since the death of its founder, that the young Yves Saint Laurent showed his first collection. Already an acclaimed fashion designer, his iconic models changed women’s wardrobe and designers approach to womenswear. His designs are now conserved in Foundation Pierre Bergé – Yves Saint Laurent in Paris, whose extensive archive is composed by 5,000 garments and over 15,000 accessories, drawings, paper patterns and objects.
A 1964 portrait of Yves Saint Laurent flanked by his 1988 evening outfit inspired by the Cubist movement and a cocktail dress inspired by Pop Art. Photograph: © Fondation Pierre Bergé -Yves Saint Laurent. All rights reserved
The exhibition revolves around the different recurring themes in the designer’s work, also exploring his extensive dialogue with art and displaying not only the famous Mondrian dresses, but also to Diaghilev and Picasso and tributes to Matisse, Cocteau, Braque and Van Gogh, along with some of Laurent’s most iconic pieces like the Tuxedo or models from the Russian collection.
The exhibition is on until the 25th of October 2015. For more info please visit the Bowes Museum. Browse through Europeana Fashion collection to find more designs of Yves Saint Laurent!