Before I get to my post today, I want to thank everyone who sent messages by email and on Facebook about how the Coronavirus is affecting me and the city. I am feeling fine and healthy for the moment, and staying at home as much as possible. As far as Paris, all non-essential stores are closed except food shops (luckily the foie gras shop is open next door), pharmacies, banks, and for some bizarre reason, tabacs. As soon as tomorrow, there could possibly more drastic restrictions much like Italy. I will keep you posted here. Please stay healthy, cautious, and safe.
After meeting in a chic night club in Paris in 1971, they became inseparable BFF’s for over 30 years. So goes the story of Yves Saint Laurent’s obsessive relationship with Catroux. She was his model, muse, confidante, travel companion, sometime savior, and much more.
The latest exhibition at the YSL Museum , documents the relationship between Yves Saint Laurent and Betty Catroux with clothes, photos, memorabilia, and videos.
Betty Catroux was born in Rio in 1945 and arrived in Paris at the age of 4. She was a model for Chanel for two years before marrying interior designer Francois Catroux in 1967. In 1971, Saint Laurent spotted her at New Jimmy’s night club on Boulevard Montparnasse, and it was love at first site, followed by an inseparable friendship.
To Saint-Laurent, Catroux was the perfect embodiment of his lifestyle, attitude, spirit, and best of all, his clothes. Her tall, small busted and small hipped figure had just the right combination of the masculine and feminine Saint Laurent played with in his clothes, along with her blonde mane and dark, exaggerated sunglasses. In fact, Saint Laurent said she was his “feminine double”, and in the following years she played an essential inspiration for his designs.
In a generous gesture to the YSL Museum, Catroux donated over 300 pieces of her personal YSL wardrobe. Anthony Vaccarello, the current designer for YSL, was given carte blanche to curate an exhibition dedicated to Catroux and has done a bang-up job.
The first part of the show is a conglomeration of photos, notes, and letters, that exemplify the manic pursuance of their one goal in life: to live for only a good time, with all the excesses it implied.
In the next rooms are brilliantly posed black mannequins with blonde wigs exacting Catroux’s hair and her signature sunglasses, showing off the clothes. With such an extravagance of black garments and low lighting, it was sometimes difficult to distinguish the materials and the details, but nevertheless the clothes shine. Many of Saint Laurent’s most iconic looks are shown, including the safari jacket, variations of the breakthrough tuxedo jacket, and leather jumpsuits and jackets.
The most illuminating part of the exhibition is a poignant but not overly sentimental video of Catroux selecting certain garments of the collection and sharing about them, while Anthony Vaccarello is interviewing her.
Until October 11, 2020
Museé Yves Saint Laurent
5 Avenue Marceau, 75116
https://museeyslparis.com/en/exhibitions/betty-catroux-yves-saint-laurent
Also read the N.Y. Times interview with Betty Cartoux
19 Things About Betty Catroux -A conversation with the fashion dissenter, gender pioneer, reluctant muse to no end of designers and Yves Saint Laurent’s “double.”
If you are homebound during the virus crisis and looking for films to watch, please watch my partner Vincent's film After Louie with Alan Cumming
Here's link to view it on Amazon
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