Espace Louis Vuitton Tokyo is pleased to present Gilbert & Georges' iconic large-scale triptych, Class War, Militant, Gateway (1986), for the first time in Japan. This exhibition is part of the Fondation Louis Vuitton's "Hors-les-murs" (Beyond the Walls) program, which continues to promote the Fondation's mission of introducing selected works from its collection to a wider audience around the world. In addition to Tokyo, this program is also ongoing at Espace Louis Vuitton locations in Munich, Venice, Beijing, Seoul and Osaka.

Gilbert Prosch (born 1943 in San Martino in Badia, Italy) and George Passmore (born 1942 in Plymouth, England) met at Central Saint Martins School of Art in London in 1967. They soon decided to form the duo Gilbert & George, and as early as 1969 they performed one of the earliest public performances, Singing Sculpture, in which the two, with their faces powdered with bronze, stood on a table and sang the title song originally sung by Bud Flanagan and Chesney Allen in Canadian director Red Davis' 1937 film Underneath the Arches. Embracing the concept of "living sculpture," this performance took on one of 20th-century art's most ambitious attempts to erase all distinctions between art and life and made it their own. Dressed in formal suits and ties, Gilbert & George literally embodied their characters, maintaining a neutral expression no matter the situation, posing like statues in galleries and museums.

In 1971, the duo began using photography to promote "art for everyone," reclaiming the smorgasbord of British and international popular culture shaped and disseminated by the media. Religion, sexuality, death, and violence, often featured on tabloid covers, became central themes in their work, inspired by life in the working-class East End of London, where they settled at the beginning of their career. Gilbert & George invented a new kind of humanism with universal content, but refused to impose a clear interpretation.

Their renowned photomontages are rigorously constructed according to meticulous rules. First in black and white, then in color, their grid-like compositions have often been likened to stained glass. Their use of computer graphics, which began in 2004, allowed them to create increasingly sophisticated, allegorical works.

The Fondation Louis Vuitton's collection includes a substantial body of work by Gilbert & George dating from 1971 to 2019, including works from their latest series. A manifesto for the modern epic, Class War, Militant, Gateway (1986) was their first major work. It depicts the individual's journey from belonging to a community to the emergence of personal conscience and self-affirmation. As with most of their work, the images are arranged in a black-bordered grid, with a frieze dominated by red, white, and blue. Gilbert & George replace the vertical "pyramid of oppression" with a horizontality of a society that no longer appears divided by class. This democratic harmony is expressed here through the simple blue work clothes worn by all the figures in the foreground: trousers or shorts.

This is the first time Gilbert & George's work has been exhibited in Japan since 2009, and it is a rare opportunity for Espace Louis Vuitton Tokyo to present this masterpiece, selected from the Fondation Louis Vuitton collection, in Japan.


About the Artists

Gilbert Prosch (born 1943 in San Martino in Badia, Italy) and George Passmore (born 1942 in Plymouth, UK) are based in London, UK. The two met at Central Central Saint Martins School of Art in London in 1967 and soon formed the duo Gilbert & George.
After staging performances and developing their drawing techniques, Gilbert & George began working with photography in 1971, producing black-and-white works in a variety of formats and arranging them as scattered murals. Beginning in 1974, they began combining multiple photographs into single works, in which the black outlines of the frames create grid-like structures. Since the early 2000s, they have used computer graphics to create increasingly sophisticated allegories addressing the dynamics of the contemporary world.
Gilbert & George have been exhibiting internationally since 1970. They won the Turner Prize in 1986, represented the UK at the 2005 Venice Biennale, and were honoured with a major retrospective at London's Tate Modern in 2007. In recent years, their work has been exhibited in solo exhibitions at prestigious museums such as the Kunsthalle Zurich in Switzerland (2020), the Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Sweden (2019), the Ludwig Museum of Contemporary Art in Budapest, Hungary (2017), MoMA in New York City, USA (2015), and the New National Museum of Monaco (2014), among others.


About Fondation Louis Vuitton

The Fondation Louis Vuitton is an arts institution dedicated to contemporary art and artists, as well as to significant 20th-century works that have inspired contemporary artists. The Foundation aims to engage a wide range of audiences through its collections and the exhibitions it hosts. The building, designed by Canadian-American architect Frank Gehry, is already recognized as an iconic example of 21st-century architecture and embodies the Foundation's unique approach to the development of the arts. Since its opening in October 2014, the Foundation has welcomed more than six million visitors from France and around the world.

The Fondation Louis Vuitton has committed itself to actively developing international initiatives, both in its own programs and through collaborations with private and public institutions, including other foundations and museums. These include the Pushkin Museum in Moscow and the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg (Icons of Modern Art: The Shchukin Collection in 2016 and The Morozov Collection in 2021), the Museum of Modern Art in New York (Being Modern: MoMA in Paris) and the Courtauld Gallery in London (The Courtauld Collection. A Vision for Impressionism). The Foundation also provides artistic direction for the "Hors-les-murs" (Beyond the Walls) program, which aims to showcase the collection at the Espaces Louis Vuitton in Tokyo, Munich, Venice, Beijing, Seoul and Osaka. The exhibitions held in these spaces are free of charge to the public, and the Foundation promotes its activities through various related cultural communications.


CLASS WAR 1986 363 x 1010 cm
MILITANT 1986 363 x 758 cm
GATEWAY 1986 363 x 758 cm
Period: October 14, 2021 - March 6, 2022
Opening hours: 11:00-19:00
Closing days are the same as the Louis Vuitton Omotesando store. Admission is free and no reservations are required
To prevent overcrowding inside the venue, you may have to wait to enter.

Espace Louis Vuitton Tokyo
7th Floor, Louis Vuitton Omotesando Building, 5-7-5 Jingumae, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo 150-0001

For inquiries:
T 0120 00 1854
contact_jp@louisvuitton.com

(Image credit)
CLASS WAR, MILITANT, GATEWAY (1986)
Exhibition view at Espace Louis Vuitton Tokyo, 2021
Courtesy of Fondation Louis Vuitton
© Gilbert & George
Photo credits: © Keizo Kioku / Louis Vuitton

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