Gilbert & George TOYNBEE ROAD, 2020

Created over the past two years, Gilbert & George’s NEW NORMAL PICTURES are a continuation of their street-level explorations of modern life. They liken this visionary and moral journey to a modern-day Pilgrim’s Progress, walking the streets and recording their observations in pictures that chart the past, the present and the future. In TOYNBEE ROAD (2020), Gilbert & George appear in their characteristic formal suits on a street near their home and studio at 12 Fournier Street in London’s East End. They are each holding a spade, which the artists point out is used to dig graves and therefore serves as a memento mori – a reminder of one’s own mortality. The work forms an otherworldly vision of East London that is subtly off-kilter, not-quitenormal, where even the familiar figures of the artists themselves are rendered uncanny and, in their own words, ‘disturbing’.

Gilbert & George’s NEW NORMAL PICTURES are currently on view at our Paris Pantin gallery, until 31 July.