Drawing, Maison Alix

• Maison Alix

• 30x18,2 cm
• Gift of the Pierre Bergé / Yves Saint Laurent Foundation
• Summer 1939
• Pencil and gouache on paper
• GAL211.E.5.26
• Palais Galliera, musée de la Mode de la Ville de Paris

This particularly sophisticated drawing can be seen as an encapsulation of Mademoiselle Alix's output of evening dresses. Colour is muted and sparingly used and the cut conceals its complexity behind an overall fluidity of line that gives an impression of being exactly right in its elongation and highlighting of the wearer's silhouette. This was the second half of the 1930s and the ideal body shape was that of Wallis Simpson: athletic shoulders, narrow hips and a slimness superseded by a thinness identified with elegance and high social status.  

The pose is that of every worldly-wise woman of the period – only the cigarette is lacking – while at the same time showing the characteristically curved back and pinched-in waist with which Alix began the  quick sketches she then turned over to her designers and illustrators.

Notice's author : Laurent Cotta