She has a habit of declaring her desire to deliver the unexpected.

But although Lady Gaga’s performance at the MTV Video Music Awards in New York City on Sunday night was vaguely impressive visually, the singer mostly just brought back a collection of old looks in a performance art piece that could have easily been named ‘the evolution of Gaga’.

The 27-year-old singer hit the red carpet – with her father as her date – in a dress that was particularly conservative for her, before undergoing a whirlwind of wardrobe transformations within a matter of minutes on stage.

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It started with a blank canvas: Lady Gaga delivered a relatively unsurprising performance at MTV’s VMA’s on Sunday night which saw her undergo multiple wardrobe changes, ending in these seashells

Gaga opened the night with a performance of her latest single entitled Applause, which would be her first stage appearance since her hip surgery.

As a planned slice of irony, her show opened with a resounding ‘boo’ from the audience.

The pop star made a grand entrance wearing an all-white ensemble and her face tightly framed by a large white headdress, essentially looking like a blank piece of paper crossed with a priest.

Unveiling Gaga: the singer was soon stripped of her gaudy white attire and ended up in a seashell thong bikini with a giant flowing blonde wig

And then this: the pop star’s face was painted as it is in her Applause single cover and a yellow wig was planted on her head by her dancers

Quite the view! Gaga’s dancers, clad in black lycra suits, were responsible for most of the heavy lifting during the performance

Stripped bare, huge hair: as she belted out the final notes to Applause, Gaga’s costume was minimal and she wore a giant wig

She began by staring out from her white wall, uttering the opening lyrics with a painfully stilted look on her face.

The singer then – quite literally – broke out of the white enclosure, and her performance seemed to begin.

With the help of her dancers – who doubled as stage hands – Gaga proceeded to undergo multiple transformations throughout her routine, appearing to symbolically evolving from her opening status as a ‘blank canvas’.

The gaudy nun look is one the star has been giving a trial run in her day-to-day outfits of late, perhaps in the lead-up to tonight’s display.

See those shells: the Poker Face singer wound up in a seashell bikini and giant wig, an ensemble she wore as part of her Applause music video

Transformations: Lady Gaga underwent a number of wardrobe change on stage with the help of her dancers’ nifty hands, going from a black bodysuit to a blue blazer to a yellow wig and back again

Circus art? The singer wore a skintight bodysuit and blonde wig as she and her dancers threw blue balls about the stage

When it was time for a change, the singer stood still while the dancers surrounded her and skilfully made it happen within the blink of an eye.

From the white ensemble, Gaga was stripped down to a black bodysuit and a blonde wig was slipped onto her head.

She hopped about in this for a while before everyone on stage started throwing around blue balls as well as Gaga herself in the quickly escalating performance art display.

Stilted: Gaga opened her performance with a frighteningly stiff face but thankfully broke out of it immediately after breaking out of the white box

Yikes: the singer sported a particularly frightened looking expression as she endured her uncomfortable looking art

With with the help of her dancers’ nifty hands, Gaga then lost that wig and her face was suddenly painted in the same way it is on the Applause single cover.

A curly yellow wig was thrown onto her head as the lycra-clad dancers worked up a sweat on stage.

Gaga then ran away – literally – and re-emerged after a much more complex change: this time, she wore a seashell bikini and giant blonde curly wig.

Like a painting? Lady Gaga has often expressed her desire to create art and art was created on her on Sunday as her face was painted on stage

Stripping back the layers: the star stood there while her multitasking dancers removed her items of clothing to reveal a different Gaga underneath

The latter was one of the many outfits she wore in her music video for Applause, so it’s unlikely she delivered any major surprises as such to her fans in this performance.

It was a fairly basic dance routine for Gaga, who largely acted as a canvas for the extravagant imagery.

But the controversial singer never claimed to be big on dance routines; re-creating her own form of pop art seems to be her priority.

From all angles: Gaga was thrown about the stage in the high-energy performance

So which one are you? Gaga later found time to chat up the boys from One Direction, showing off her tanned and rather toned backside as she did so

Earlier in the evening, Lady Gaga made an uncharacteristically ‘normal’ turn on the red carpet.

The Bad Romance songstress – who once wore a large steak as an accessory – wore a relatively simply black gown with a long train and bunching at the waist.

It’s safe to say that Gaga even looked demure, as she flashed a particularly natural looking smile.

Scared? The boy-band looked somewhat afraid or at least surprised by their photo opportunity with the seashell-clad songstress

Time for a change! A blue blazer with giant shoulder pads was another part of Gaga’s wardrobe for the evening

Stealing her away: the dancers really made the show what it was, working hard on every aspect from stage management to wardrobe to actual dancing

Papa Germanotta! Lady Gaga showed a snippet of the humanity she’s often slammed for not having by bringing her father, Joe, as her date

In a surprising twist, the Poker Face singer brought her father, Joe Germanotta, as her date.

One of the main complaints about the singer’s highly stylized and arguably contrived front has been that she lacks humanity.

The mere reminder that Gaga – whose real name is Stefani Germanotta – even has family like the rest of us was probably a good choice.

Toning it down: Gaga wore a positively demure black dress with a fun train and bunching at the waist, offering perhaps the best surprise of the evening

Making herself heard: Gaga took over the microphone from MTV’s presenters

Look out behind you! The Bad Romance singer’s dress boasted a lengthy train flowing down from the flattering design

She smiles! The Applause songstress offered a smile on the evening, breaking her run of charactery poses that saw her face in a near-constant pouting state

 

Joe looked proud to be standing beside his daughter at the star-studded event.

Gaga’s performance was the first of a night full of stars as the VMAs aired from Brooklyn’s Barclays Center for the first time.

Justin Timberlake, fellow top nominees Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, Katy Perry, Drake, Kanye West, Miley Cyrus and Robin Thicke also performed.

There’s a human in there! Perhaps Papa Germanotta brought out a new level of playfulness in the singer

Stars make their arrival at 2013 MTV Video Music AwardsLoaded: 0%Progress: 0%0:00PreviousPlaySkipMuteCurrent Time0:00/Duration Time1:55FullscreenNeed Text