Regarder!

Last chance to see The fashion world of Jean Paul Gaultier at The Barbican.

The first thing that stops you in your tracks are the faces of the models. From a distance you think they are real people as their expressions change, they look at you and some of them even speak. On closer inspection is appears to be a clever audio visual trick. A little like the David Bowie 'Where are we now?' video, images of a moving face are projected onto the model. This time, more cleverly, digitally contoured to define the three dimensional head.

The frocks were pretty good too although disturbingly Gaultier described his grandmother drinking vinegar to make her stomach contract in order to fit into a corset.

Seeing all his work together like this allows you to see his many influences from Frida Kahlo to Gunther von Hagens. Also how his once radical ideas have been appropriated into the mainstream.