City in Pink

Arles has been drenched in pink light to celebrate Christian Lacroix as curator of Recontres de Photographies d'Arles 2008 and his exhibition at the Musee Reattu. The glass panels in the streetlights along the Rhone have been tinted to gives the river, the stone cobbled streets and the buildings a rosy glow. The Renaissance building on the banks of the Rhone was once the grand priory of the Order of Malta and then in 1790 was bought by local artist, Jacques Reattu. 

Today the Museum houses Jaques Reattu's paintings, a French photography collection established in 1965 and fifty seven drawings donated by Picasso in 1971. In 2008 the museum invited Christian Lacroix to curate an exhibition where he could draw upon the museum's standing collections, visiting artists and sculptors and showcase his fashion couture. The result is a visual extravaganza of modern and old - seventeenth century paintings alongside rubber sculpture, grisaille panels and contemporary installation, magical carpets, couture gowns, tapestries with evocative photographs and film.

Christian Lacroix was born in Arles in 1951 and from a young age began to sketch. He was fascinated with historical costumes and so began his love of form, detail and colour. He studied history of art at the University of Montpelier and continued his studies in Paris at the Sorbonne and the Louvre. 

In 1987 Lacroix opened his own couture house and in 1989 the ready to wear collection was born. His background in historical clothing and his love for colour (attributed to his Mediterranean upbringing) meant his creations were fantasy like and lavish. He became well known for his puff ball skirts, low necklines and patterned prints. Inspiration for his designs came from his broad knowledge of fashion history - corsets, crinolines and bustles were often part of his collections.

The exhibition occupied all floors of the museum and showed something like six hundred and fifty different works of art. The characters in this 'sport' installation were conceived to mirror the same postures as some of the figures in the grissaile paintings.

The paintings and couture dresses in this room have a marked resemblance - I loved Lacroix's way of hanging the pictures and photographs, in descending size and order.

'She' looked so real amongst the photographs

This is 'Rubber girl' (I hope the artist will forgive me but I don't remember her correct title) on the ground floor

and Lacroix's bridal visions under the vaults in the chapel.

The exhibition closed on December 31 after 250,000 visitors which was a triumph for Musee Reattu, for Christian Lacroix and for Arles. I loved his eclectic mix of fashion, art, sculpture and film - a truly passionate and creative amalgamation.

images - vicki archer