Exhibition dates: 25th July – 4th October 2009
Many thankx to the C/O Berlin Gallery for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.
Pierre et Gilles (French, Pierre Commoy b. 1950 and Gilles Blanchard, b. 1953)
Mercury
2001
“It’s hard to think of contemporary culture without the influence of Pierre et Gilles, from advertising to fashion photography, music video, and film. This is truly global art.”
Jeff Koons
The cosmos of the worldwide renowned French artist duo is a vivid, colourful world poised between baroque sumptuousness and earthly limbo. Pierre et Gilles create unique hand-painted photographic portraits of film icons, sailors and princes, saints and sinners, of mythological figures and unknowns alike. Pierre et Gilles pursue their own, stunningly unique vision of an enchanted world spanning fairytale paradises and abyssal depths, quoting from popular visual languages and history of art. Again and again, they re-envision their personal dream of reality anew in consummate aesthetic perfection.
Pierre et Gilles are among the most influential artists of our time. In their complex, multilayered images, they quote from art history, transgress traditional moral codes, and experiment adeptly with social clichés. Their painterly photographic masterpieces exert an intense visual power that leaves the viewer spellbound.
Over the last thirty years, Pierre et Gilles have created photographic portraits of numerous celebrities including Marc Almond, Mirelle Mathieu, Catherine Deneuve, Serge Gainsbourg, Iggy Pop, Jean-Paul Gaultier, Nina Hagen, Madonna, and Paloma Picasso. They work almost exclusively in an opulently furnished studio, where their subjects are costumed lavishly and placed before three-dimensional backgrounds. Pierre photographs the model, and Gilles retouches and hand-colours the print. The reproducible portrait is rendered unique through painting, which highlights each detail with carefully selected materials and accessories.
As only venue in Germany, C/O Berlin presents the exhibition as the first of Pierre et Gilles in fifteen years. The show comprised a total of 80 unique large-format works – from their early photographies of the 1970s to the brand new pictures that were never shown in public before.”
Text from the C/O Berlin website [Online] Cited 20/08/2009 no longer available online
Pierre et Gilles (French, Pierre Commoy b. 1950 and Gilles Blanchard, b. 1953)
St. Sebastian
1987
Pierre et Gilles (French, Pierre Commoy b. 1950 and Gilles Blanchard, b. 1953)
Neptune
1988
Pierre et Gilles (French, Pierre Commoy b. 1950 and Gilles Blanchard, b. 1953)
Saint Rose De Lima
1989
Pierre et Gilles (French, Pierre Commoy b. 1950 and Gilles Blanchard, b. 1953)
Le Petit Communiste Christophe (The Little Communist Christophe)
1990
Pierre et Gilles (French, Pierre Commoy b. 1950 and Gilles Blanchard, b. 1953)
Legend (Madonna)
1990
Pierre et Gilles (French, Pierre Commoy b. 1950 and Gilles Blanchard, b. 1953)
La Madone au coeur blessé (Madonna with a wounded heart)
1991
Pierre et Gilles (French, Pierre Commoy b. 1950 and Gilles Blanchard, b. 1953)
St. Sebastian of the Sea
1994
Pierre et Gilles (French, Pierre Commoy b. 1950 and Gilles Blanchard, b. 1953)
The Martyrdom of St Sebastian
1996
Pierre et Gilles (French, Pierre Commoy b. 1950 and Gilles Blanchard, b. 1953)
Extase (Arielle Dombasle)
2002
Pierre et Gilles (French, Pierre Commoy b. 1950 and Gilles Blanchard, b. 1953)
Le Grand Amour (Marilyn Manson and Dita von Teese)
2004
C/O Berlin
Postfuhramt
Oranienburger Straße 35/36
10117 Berlin
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Daily 11am – 8pm
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