COCTEAU Jean (Illustrator)

The legend on this fashion drawing reads, "Paris 1937". Schiaparelli made this tapering sheath dress for dining and dancing; Jean Cocteau drew it for Harper's Bazaar. Cocteau was a writer, film-maker, painter, print-maker, stage-, fabric- and jewellery-designer and fashion illustrator. His entrée into the world of fashion came through the theatre. Cocteau met Diaghilev when the Ballets Russes came to Paris in 1910 and he designed posters for him. Some of Cocteau's most important work for the theatre and fashion included his collaborations with Chanel. Between 1922 and 1937 she designed costumes for a whole cycle of his plays, including Le Train Bleu of 1924. He often sketched her and her fashions in his characteristic form of outline drawing with its sharp line and elegant simplicity. Cocteau was also closely associated with Surrealism and fashion. For Schiaparelli he designed fabrics, embroideries and jewellery. 

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