throughout their career gilbert & george have
had their work referred to as camp, smutty,
profane and laden with innuendo. they have
provoked outrage from all angles of society
whilst confronting a gamut of fundamental
human issues through a mix of performance
art, video, drawing, painting and photographs.

'gilbert & george: major exhibition' starts
at the very beginning of their 40 year career
with documentation of their early and
revolutionary 'living sculptures' work in which,
they became living sculptures in art galleries
to confront the notion that sculpture was
confined to three-dimensional objects.
this work is displayed with rarely seen
charcoal on paper sculptures and followed
by pictures of an increasingly powerful
social engagement.

through-out the 1980s and 1990s gilbert & george
continued to confront issues but progressed
from performance to mainly photographic
work using an explosive colour palate.
among the works displayed from this
compelling period are the quadripartite
'death hope life fear'; 'life without end';
the scandalous 'naked shit pictures'
and the instinctive
'fundamental and new testamental pictures'
featuring the artists' own blood, tears, spunk,
piss, shit and sweat. the final section of the
exhibition explores gilbert & george's visionary
twenty-first-century art from the promiscuous
'new horny pictures' to the 'ginko pictures'
exhibited at the venice biennale in 2005
all of which continue to ask provocative
questions about sexuality, identity and religion.

the show ends with their controversial
‘sonofagod pictures’ including
'was jesus heterosexual?' which drew
accusations of blasphemy and their new
work 'bomb pictures' especially created
for the show. in 'bomb pictures' they have
assembled photographs from newspaper
posters containing the words 'bomb' 'terror'
or 'bomber' and used them to create
an urban landscape.

gilbert proesch was born in st. martin,
italy on september 11, 1943 and
george passmore was born in devon,
england on january 8, 1942.
they met whilst studying sculpture at
st. martins school of art in 1967
and have operated together as one
artist ever since. past exhibitions of their
work have been held at the museum of
modern art in new york;
the china national art gallery in beijing;
museum of contemporary art in chicago and
galerie bugdahn und kaimer in duesseldorf.
they were shortlisted for the turner prize
in 1984 and won it in 1986.
gilbert & george currently live and work
in east london, uk.