Sketch by YSL for the painting Tour de Chant in the music-hall show Zizi Jeanmaire. Foundation Pierre Bergé – Yves Saint Laurent

Zizi by Beatrice Brandini

At the Del Roscio Foundation in Rome, an exhibition offers us an interesting documentation linked to the passion for the theater of the great Yves Saint Laurent. Drawings, sketches, scene sketches for ballet and theater, made by the great master testify to it.

Sketch by Yves Saint Laurent for Le Mariage de Figaro. Foundation Pierre Bergé – Yves Saint Laurent

Costumes and Scenes for Ballet, Theater and Music Hall is a project curated by Stephan Janson in collaboration with the Musée Yves Saint Laurent in Marrakech and the Musée Yves Saint Laurent in Paris, at the Fondazione Nicola Del Roscio in Rome.

Sketch by Yves Saint Laurent for the costumes for the queen of the show L’Aigle à deux têtes . Foundation Pierre Bergé – Yves Saint Laurent

The exhibition presents about 60 drawings that range from the distant 1959, the year of the costumes for the ballet Cyrano de Bergerac, conceived by Roland Petit, to 1978, the year of the comedy L’Aigle à deux têtes, by Jean Cocteau.

   

Sketch by Yves Saint Laurent for Zizi Jeanmaire. A photo of Zizi Jeanmaire

Also important is the partnership with the dancer Zizi Jeanmarie, with unforgettable collaborations, costumes and fashion shows. A dancer who in the Sixties became very popular also in Italy, a regular guest on the Rai Studio Uno show, of which, in this exhibition, we can admire photographs but also the video Champagne Rose, from 1965, in which Zizi is dressed in a cloud of pink feathers created by her friend Saint Laurent.

Sketch of a costume for the ballet Masquerade from 1962. Foundation Pierre Bergé – Yves Saint Laurent

Yves’s passion for the theater dates back to his childhood when in his hometown in Algeria he attended a performance with costumes and sets designed by the painter Christian Bérard, a figure who will remain important forever for the couturier. Probably if Saint Laurent had not approached fashion (it would have been a great loss), he would have become a highly esteemed costume and set designer, also because his clothes and collections have always told an original story.

Sketch of the costumes for the Le Réveil du Sultan tableau. Foundation Pierre Bergé – Yves Saint Laurent

Thousands of women in the world have been lucky enough to wear his clothes, the same can be said for the actresses or dancers who have entered the character also thanks to the costumes of Yves Saint Laurent, among all we think of a magnificent Catherine Deneuve in the film by Luis Bunuel Belle de Jour.

It is nice that an exhibition without too much fanfare highlights the talent of Saint Laurent as a costume designer and set designer. His figures dance on paper as his creations made women more beautiful and “light”.

Yves Saint Laurent at the inauguration of the exhibition Yves Saint Laurent Costumes de théâtre, Paris 1974. Photo Giancarlo Botti

Good life to everyone!

Beatrice