It is through this symbol that Ann Huybens most often likes to define herself. The symbol takes off, twists itself, folds back rolling, and finally comes to a halt, giving itself up with great elegance.

All dimensions are issued from a single point of departure or neural node, and naturally encircle and swathe the body. And this body talks back.

Because it is to the body that Ann Huybens draws her full attention. When she clothes the body, she really enters into dialogue – listens to its histories, awakens its every desire.

This is what makes every piece of clothing unique onto itself – it is the fruit of an intimate relationship.

The general refinement of the model now draws her to Haute Couture – as well as the plunge into the depths of detail.

She considers beauty to be at the crossroads of many different pathways.Times long since past, the qualities of the used materials, their often anachronistic yet precisely chosen characteristics… ‘Woman’ is not just a support onto which we drape clothes – she reveals herself through them.

As evidence, evidently. Forced out, she gives herself away – and so pleases herself. Seduction – eroticism – character.

Ann Huybens entertains strong links with the worlds and practices of contemporary visual arts, dance and literature.

This is why her défilés resemble performances instead of the archetypal, endlessly repeated presentation of strings of models. Seduction is lived out – from and out of the interior, into the exterior.

Emotionally charged, sometimes crude, cruel and dramatic, but always full of lyricism. In her made-to-measure couture collection « Night & » that took over one year of hard craft to make, Ann Huybens presents us with 347 ensembles.

347 histories – a piece a day, so to speak…

Text Philippe Blondez,translated by Dieter Roelstraete