“I HAVE ALWAYS WANTED, BOTH IN COUTURE AND READY-TO-WEAR, TO MAKE COLLECTIONS THAT COULD APPEAR TO DIFFERENT WOMEN, OF ALL STYLES AND ALL AGES.”

Jean Paul Gaultier is a benevolent voyeur, curious about everything, fascinated by differences. Worlds untouched by the standardization of fashion are his stylistic fields of exploration. By transpositions, diversions and assemblages, it gives shape to cross-border mixtures.

Between the uniform of the masses and the dream showcase of parades shows, Jean Paul Gaultier remains convinced that fashion will always have a special place: “It is a need for visual recognition, for even claim”. But the designer refuses to be branded as a politician or a provocateur. This man of convictions defines himself more as a dissenter. The militant iconoclast systematically questions the clichés, norms, codes, conventions and traditions that he twists, shifts, reverses, destroys the better to reinvent them.

Protruding sailor tops and “tattoo” silks, “i-conical” corsets, unstructured biker, Jean Paul Gaultier’s lexicon is infinite, fifty years of magic and a smile forever.