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Lot Essay
Pierre et Gilles's Le Fumeur de Narguilé transports the viewer directly to that dream-like ambiances plentiful of Baroque comfort. As with every example of their work, in this painted photograph everything is a fantasy; the atmosphere, the motley environment, the smoker's relaxed but inviting mood, the unbelievable majesty of the smoking pipe. The setting shimmers, and suggests a narrative ready to be embraced by any of us but in a decidedly unreachable way. In other words, a place like this may exist only in our most luscious fantasies. This is an ode to the absolute subjectivity of the journey; to what has been lived and seen by the artists; a jigsaw of memories and experiences masterly translated in images for the rest of us.
The East for Pierre et Gilles relates not only to a desire to make a reconnection with the remote past, to their roots: to a certain nostalgia associated with those foreign realms, with that restless yet human desire to venture into the unknown; but, above all, to a fervent longing for understanding what may seem different from us at first glance. In other words, theirs is a desire to build in a bridge between two separate cultures by the means of Art.
The East for Pierre et Gilles relates not only to a desire to make a reconnection with the remote past, to their roots: to a certain nostalgia associated with those foreign realms, with that restless yet human desire to venture into the unknown; but, above all, to a fervent longing for understanding what may seem different from us at first glance. In other words, theirs is a desire to build in a bridge between two separate cultures by the means of Art.