Gilbert & George

Born in 1943, in United Kingdom
Lives and works in London (United Kingdom)

Soon after graduating from Saint Martin’s School of Art, where they met in 1967, Gilbert & George rose to fame through their self-proclaimed “living sculptures”.

Biography

Wearing conventional suits, their faces impassive and covered with coloured powder, they perform a 1930s song, Underneath the Arches, an anthem of the lower classes, choosing to distance themselves from their immediate artistic entourage, who were more formalist and conceptual. In everyday settings, they walk, sing, read and drink, building up a body of visual material that they assembled from the early 1970s, first in black and white, then in colour, in grid formats that have frequently been compared to stained glass. Proclaiming it as “art for all”, they developed a new humanism with a universal content while refusing to provide an interpretation. Religion, sexuality, death and violence, the stuff of tabloid headlines, are the main themes of their compositions, which are inspired by their life in a working-class area of East London, where they have lived for all of their artistic career. In 2004 they began to use computers to create increasingly sophisticated allegories reflecting changes in contemporary society.

Bibliographic resources

Fuchs, Rudolf Herman. Gilbert & George : l'œuvre en images, 1971-2005 : en deux volumes. Paris :Gallimard, 2007.

Tate modern (Londres). Gilbert & George : [exhibition, Tate Modern London, 15 February - 7 May 2007]. London : Tate publishing, 2007.

Rosenblum, Robert. Introducing Gilbert & George. New York : Thames & Hudson, 2004.

Musée d'art moderne de la ville de Paris (Paris) ; Parent, Béatrice ; Chambost, Marie-Anne... [et al.]. Gilbert & George : [exposition, Musée d'art moderne de la Ville de Paris, 4 octobre 1997-4 janvier 1998]. Paris : Paris-Musées, 1997.

Jahn, Wolf. Monarchy as democracy : On the tryptych : class war militant gateway by Gilbert & George. London : Anthony d'Offay Gallery, 1991.

Discover FLV play

In The Collection

Class War, Militant, Gateway, 1986

Gilbert & George

REST, 2019

Gilbert & George

Exhibition of the Collection

From 3 June 2015 to 4 January 2016

Pop & Music

The collection is constantly evolving. This third presentation of the Collection of the Fondation's artworks, with popist lines, including music and sound, gather more than twenty contemporary artists.

Exhibition of the Collection

From 23 September 2020 to 3 January 2021

Crossing views

Parallel to the Cindy Sherman retrospective exhibition, the Fondation presents Crossing Views, a selection of works from the Fondation's Collection which was chosen in collaboration with Cindy Sherman. Echoing her work, the exhibition is centred on the theme of the portrait and its interpretation through different approaches and media: painting, photography, sculpture, video and installation. The exhibition brings together around twenty French and international artists, of different generations and backgrounds. It includes around sixty works, many of which have previously never been on display at the Fondation.

Hors les murs

From 14 October 2021 to 6 March 2022

Gilbert & George - Class war, militant, gateway

The Espace Louis Vuitton Tokyo presents for the first time in Japan the iconic monumental triptych Class War, Militant, Gateway (1986) by Gilbert & George, within the framework of the ongoing “Hors-les-murs” programme.

Artists

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