MIAMI.- Suzy Patterson of the Miami Herald.com reported “The clothes are pure Yves Saint Laurent but they resonate with the influence of Mondrian, Braque, Matisse, Andy Warhol and other modern-art greats. A unique collection of the celebrated couturier’s designs is on view at a new museum in Saint Laurent’s former haute-couture-fashion house near the Champs-Elysees.”

Conditioning for the Yves Saint Laurent Foundation took two years. It has exhibition space, offices and storage for 5,000 haute-couture dresses.  “It’s a fine presentation, and it’s important to keep records like this,” the designer said.

The haute-couture gowns, accessories, photographs and original drawings, protected in the foundation’s temperature-controlled basement, will be visible only by special request to professionals and perhaps student groups

In the opening show, called ’’Yves Saint Laurent, a Dialogue With Art,’’ 42 elaborate art-inspired dresses dazzle. They range from amusing numbers with Andy Warhol pop-art themes or the abstract squares of Mondrian that inspired dresses in the 1960s to opulent full-skirted satin dresses of the 1980s inspired by Braque, Matisse, Bonnard and Picasso.

Also to be included in the exhibition will be some of Saint Laurent’s own modern art pieces, including a famous quadruple portrait of him by his friend, Warhol.

’’I didn’t copy the artists -- who would dare to do that?’’ Saint Laurent writes in the show’s catalog. ``But I wanted to weave together the link between painting and couture.

``How could I not have borrowed from van Gogh, his irises, his sunflowers, his wonderful colors?’’

To add more excitement to the show, it will be presented on a serpentine runway-carpet designed by decorator Jacques Grange and the Pompidou Museum’s scenographer, Nathalie Criniere. The first show runs until July 18. The foundation is also talking to photographer Irving Penn, artist David Hockney and theater director Bob Wilson about future exhibitions.