With stephen sackur. Welcome to hardtalk, im stephen sackur. Today, im in the white Cube Gallery In London as cultural life starts to re establish itself after many months of lockdown, and my guests are the artistic Duo Gilbert and george. Now, for five decades, theyve been producing controversial, provocative work, and this exhibition they call new normal pictures. But is there anything normal about Gilbert And George . Gilbert and george, welcome, both of you, to hardtalk. Thanks very much. Very kind. Very nice. Were sitting in this gallery space. This is your latest exhibition. Its called new normal pictures. Is this your response to what the world has been through in the last year and more . That is, the Covid Pandemic and lockdown . No, not at all. The title of the show and the pictures predates the pandemic. We created the pictures before the pandemic. We only called it new normal because we were so interested that people in england use the term whats the term they always use, gilbert . Existentialism. And we wanted to find an English Word for that, and so normalfor us would be the. So, this new normal of yours predates everything thats happened with the pandemic . Yes, yes. All the design of all aspects of it. Everything was ready. Were done before the pandemic. But nonetheless, as i understand it, a lot of the composition, the working and you do a lot of work on your pictures to bring them to this point all that was done during the pandemic. Yes. Because once we did finish the design, we have to do the one to one picture and that we did do in the pandemic. And it was fantastic, because we were alone doing exactly what we wanted. Its very interesting you say that, because ive read a lot about the way you live your life and the way you work, and itjust seems to me that your particular lifestyle probably wasnt that much impacted by everything that weve seen, with the isolation of lockdown, because you live a fairly isolated life anyway, dont you . Yes. I mean, i think we were very conscious the whole time of the enormous human suffering, we cant not think of that every living moment, the number of husbands and wives and mothers and fathers and children and aunts and uncles and friends who are dying before their time. Thats a very huge reality for all of us. But otherwise, i didnt think we were affected. Not being allowed to go to restaurants, that was quite a shock. Kissing waiters. No, we havent kissed a waiter since christmas. Extraordinary. Laughter. But we all brought takeaway. We have bread, Ham And Cheese in the fridge. We had to empty ourfridge, which normally only has champagne in it, and put food in there. Youre describing a life, you know, whicH Has champagne in the fridge, where you eat out a lot because you dont like to cook, and yet the Subject Matter that youve chosen to focus on in this exhibition, the new normal, is in many ways, its quite dystopian. You know, what we see are images of your neighbourhood In London which focus on trash, refuse, the paraphernalia of drug use. And you two, as ever, appear in every picture. And you look, frankly, weary, beaten, deeply subdued by experience. Is that the way youre feeling . It was quite, i mean, extraordinary, because we managed to create a world for ourselves now that we are the centre of our art. That was very important. And that, from the very beginning, was a concept. In 1968 69, we made us centre of our art. Like some artist do apples, some artists do a sky, we made ourselves. And then it became a journey through our life that was extraordinary. The journey what are we confronting every single day . And that became our subject. And this subject, when we open our door in fullness, there we are. What do you call it . The drug bags are there, the newspaper there, all the beds are there. We dont have to create anything. To look for inspiration. Inspiration of our world is there. But what does it say about you two . Im looking over your shoulders to this particular picture behind you. Youve titled it priority seat, and there you both are in your tweed suits, and youre at a Bus Stop and youre both slumped as though youve completely run out of energy. You look sort of befuddled and baffled. I come back to this point is that the way you are feeling today . Youd make a very good Art Critic. I love the description of it. Its marvellous. But is that the way you are feeling . We are involved in thought transference. So, like a writer does words that will put thoughts and feelings into the readers, so these images have to transfer thought, things that you cant put into word, exactly, you can put in pictures. Theyre very delicate examples of human existence, things we all know. As we step out of the front door of number 12, fornier street, were stepping not out into the east end of london, were stepping into a french street built on a roman cemetery, which, when we were students, was the yiddish speaking district. We are five minutes from the dissidents cemetery. We have a mosque at one end, an Anglican Church at the other end, the Opium Den that Oscar Wilde went to was on brick lane, thejewish all on brick lane. Extraordinary world. I want to come back to what you said, gilbert, about the journey. And you always place yourselves in the centre of this Journey Youve made, in the course of 50 years of creativity. If we were looking at some of your earlier works, on bbc television, we wouldnt be able to show some of the words and images, because over the years, and people remember you for it, in the � 70s, � 80s, you focused a lot on taboo subjects. You know, im thinking of the Human Body all of it, all of the orifices, all of the bodily fluids, of the faeces, the urine, the genitalia all in different ways were taboos that you put Front And Centre in your artwork. Have you stopped doing that . No, i think all those pictures still exist. They travel the world. We have a show on in frankfurt at the moment with pictures from a retrospective. We only want to de shock, not to shock. Sorry, you wanted to what . To de shock. What do you mean by. . To take the Shock Element out of it, to make it a normality that we can live with. Not that anyone has to throw up the arms in fear and. Just to get normal about things, yes. The journalists would say, why do you want to be provocative . We never wanted to be provocative. Because that would be very superficial. If you were just simply trying to evoke a shock. Of course. That really wouldnt get us very far. We never, we never wanted to do that. We like to provoke thought, but not to be provocative a very subtle difference. So, when you did that exhibition, which focused on your own faeces. We did two groups of pictures. What was the deeper meaning . We had enormous, enormous support for these pictures. And we still have. Theres nothing in our pictures which is not also in the Holy Bible its not so shocking. Yes. Lets call it normal. We know that we are. We have bum holes. We have that. Everybody has that. And everything is taboo because of religion. But do you think. . Because of religion. Its only because of the wicked romans. If not, wed be fine. Yeah, but lets leave the romans aside. Im just really interested in the journey you two have made over 50 years. Do you think things that were deeply taboo and did get you, sort of, you know, a lot of publicity and a lot of notoriety in the 1980s, have they become much more sort of acceptable, that society, Notjust You Two have changed but society has changed . Yes. What about sex . We knew that, 1967, when we were baby artists walking out of St Martins school of art, london was an entirely different place. England was an entirely different place. The world was a different place. And what has happened in those 50, nearly 60 years, weve been a small part of playing the change. Were very proud of that. Do you like the london, the england, the uk of today, better than that place that you began Making Art . 0h, weve always loved london. And of course. Its all the same evolution, we call it. One big walk that we are doing. And everybody, when we first started out, they all called us queers in all the Art World. Even the Art Critic oh, the silly queers art. It was most extraordinary, because there was the morality of that day was totally different, and we want to change the morality, that you can look at a naked person. In the renaissance, they were able to look at naked people who were doing whatever they want. Why not today . And it is changing in an extraordinary way. And we were able to confront, even, like, the dirty word, no . That word, � dirty� , is at the heart of a lot of what youve done, because dirty, you know, doesntjust mean the literal sense of being soiled with dirt. Unacceptable. In the english language, it carries this much deeper meaning, tied to sexuality, to bodily functions, where there are certain things we dont want to think about or be confronted with. But they all love it. All young people all love it. Yes, we have a huge community now, not of tramps damaged by the first and second world war, theyve all gone. We had thousands and thousands of tramps as students. And now we have a small community of people involved in drugs. And we were walking down whitechapel. Even in your neighbourhood of london . Yes. Essentially, homeless people. Yes, homeless. Drug addicts. Many drug addicts. There are several hostels. Thats the new community, really. And we have a certain following amongst those people. They never went to an exhibition, they never saw a catalogue, but they understand that we have something of life for them. One of the things, profound things, thats changed in the course of your lifetimes is that when you were growing up and entering adulthood, homosexuality was still criminalised in the uk. Oh. Yes. 67 was decriminalisation. Thats chimed exactly with our time leaving St Martins. I mean, we thought we were living in the centre of the universe in � 67. So, you couldnt be public about the fact you are not just an artistic duo, you were life partners. We didnt think of it in those terms. We dont really believe so much in the male and female, or the gay or the straight. We think of a more general, more human. It was more sexy, yeah. But it was an amazing battle. It was an amazing battle from the Art Critics, non stop attacking us for being two men together. It was all over the world and was extraordinary. But we won. We won. You think there was a deep seated prejudice inside the Art World . Which you would think, frankly, has a reputation for being more open minded, more liberal. A lot of Closet Gay bashers, mostly. Famous Art Critics, like the most famous newspaper in england, or. Especially on the left. More on the left. But we always remember, we have a favourite singer called Fred Barnes, who died before the second world war, and he was an extraordinary outsider. And he wrote a marvellous song. Ill read you the words. Its so beautiful, still. You can imagine this is before the second world war. Its a queer, Queer World we live in. And Dame Nature plays a funny game. Some get all the sunshine, others get the shame. I dont know why, but since i was born. The scapegrace i seem to be. Ever since i was a little boy at school, a name has stuck to me. Yes, im the black, Black Sheep of the family. Everybody runs me down. People shake their heads at me and say im a disgrace to society. But ill try my luck in the colonies. There, ill rise or fall. And when i come back that sheep that was black. Will perhaps be the whitest of them all. We think thats very, very beautiful, and it means a lot to us as a song. He was thought to be the most handsome man in britain for 20 years. He was known in Australia And North america. Its a marvellous song. Its fascinating to hear that. Its an extraordinary song. He wouldnt have been able to imagine what is the reality for you that you two, of course, today, can marry. We are. We had a civil partnership, yeah. Of course. I mean, his Fred Barnes� father gassed himself at the horror of his son and Fred Barnes gassed himself at The End of his life. Let me ask you this. You present yourself to the world as a unit. You know, you are an artistic single entity. 0ne artist. 0ne. Thats the way you see it. We always say two people, one artist. Well, you call yourselves Living Sculptures. That was our invention, and it was the best invention. But, hang on, let me continue the thought so here you are, you are, lets face it, two individuals, but as far as youre concerned, you are one artist. How on earth does that work . Are you telling me that over 50 years of productivity and creativity, you have never had a significant difference about the work youre doing . No, we didnt have it because we realised we had to succeed. And Everything Nothing matters except succeeding, and we do. We are not there yet, but we are doing it every single day. But you are not the same person. You must have differences of artistic vision. Youre not clones of each other. We remember very well the early years of our career together. The most common comment in the press, in the media, was oh, its very interesting, but of course it wont last two people. They never lasted. Theyve all been divorced 17 times, not us, right . Yeah. And the artists many, many are totally forgotten. But if im to take gilbert seriously, part of the reason you havent divorced is that you simply cant afford it. Youre right about that which makes me a little cynical, you know, youve got something going here which, frankly, apart from Anything Else as youve told me many of the pictures we see around us have already sold, and i dare say sold for a great deal of money. You know, this is a business as well as a creative enterprise youre running. We need money, of course, but we created a Living Sculpture that is two people together that we started in 68. That is our Centre Part of art. We created this Living Sculpture and we are walking through life and what we call confronting life in different ways. And thats our pictures. What we confront in our life is in our pictures, so we have all the subjects. 0ur subject, that are inside ourselves, are part of universal thought. Death. Hope. Life. Fear. Sex. Money. Race. Religion. Naked. Human. World. All the thoughts and feelings that lie inside everyone. And we are never run out of subjects, because theyre, even getting old, its an amazing subject for us i know that all too well myself but im not sure youve really answered my question about how you actually always work together as a unit. I think we never ask the question when we make our pictures, ever. And its also true that we buy a newspaper in the morning. We watch television to check on the enemy at six oclock every day and we know that, out there, there is a huge battle in every single aspect of human life, country to country, company to company, politician to pol so its an enormous. Sorry, whats this battle . The world. Its a huge battle, yeah . But who do you regard as combatants . No, i mean, countries are fighting countries and people and companies are fighting companies. Like democracy. We didnt want to be like that. We didnt want to be fighting. Democracy and totalitarian countries now, with the battle beyond belief. Well, i want to get to more political questions in a minute, butjust let me finish with this personal stuff. We never ask that question, what goes, when we make our picture. But is one of you more the Ideas Person and the other the editor. . Oo H H it it doesnt work like that. It doesnt it doesnt work like that. Remember, the world is divided into twosomes. Its the most common arrangement, even in the animal kingdom, twos. But we never ask that question. They dont always stay together, whereas you two have. But we never ask that question. Normally, thejournalists, do you argue a lot. They say, ah, The Great Heterosexual Question and people laugh immediately. We dont, and we taught ourself. We dont argue. We taught ourself. And we wouldnt tell you if we did. No, i dont suppose you would, but could either of you imagine Making Art on your own . No. Just as a Side Project . Certainly not. Never. Because we invented ourself together. Before that, we were silly art students. But we went there, because we were not accepted in the beginning, that we created these two people vision. But, i mean, i think a german magazine once asked you so, what happens to your art when one of you dies . Thats the great german question. Yeah. Only in. So, i mean, its brutal, but its serious. Only in germany they ask that. If you can only imagine Making Art together, if one of you is no longer capable, do you just. You quit . I think we stop. We did nearly we did nearly 8,000 artworks. Its too early to be thinking about that anyway. Is it . You said death is one of your subjects and, of course, we all, as we get older, think about it more. Its the same question you can ask any two people in the world. You wouldnt ask the Taxi Driver what are you going to do when your missus dies . We just simply believe in the amazing power of culture, the world that we live in. We are safe and free. Youre not safe and free in every country in the world. We are safe and free In London town, in melbourne and in ottawa, and other countries because of culture. Its not the church they didnt arrange it. The politicians didnt arrange the permissive Society Or Anything else. Writers and thinkers and Picture Makers and poets, composers they did that. Mm hm. It seems to me. Youre more indebted to those. We accepted it. We always said we were conservatives. And i liked that. Small c conservatives . Yeah. And you certainly look at the way you dress. I mean, you couldnt be trying to evoke a more, sort of, you know. Normal. Normal appearance. Conservative image with the way you look. And yet, as weve discussed already in this conversation, the Subject Matter is is often deeply sexual, its covering all of the taboos that weve discussed. Youre sort of conservatives who then play, and have almost a joke at the expense. No, no playing. No playing. But. Nojokes. But dressed up like that, its more powerful. You can get away with anything. Is that why you do it . This is your camouflage . No. You can get a table in any restaurant in the world and were hardly ever searched at airports. Its very good. Very good. But we started out in 1968 because we were going to different galleries to sell ourselves, no . So we put on these suits at that time and then we call it the whats it called . Responsibility. The responsibility suits of our art. And thats the vision in 1969. Im just wondering in The End whether there is an element of play to what you do. No. Whether we should take you seriously or not. If you want to be simple about that, its even more simple. As lower class people, we were brought up that, on important occasions, you dress properly and nicely. If you go to a wedding or a funeral or a christening or if you apply for a job or if you go for an interview, put on a Suit And Tie and do your hair nicely. For important occasions, yeah . And we believe that every single day of our life is important. And you call yourself a lower class person. Of course. But would it be fair to say that you have had a running battle with the art elite, the art establishment, because you think they dont give you the respect that you deserve . I mean, frankly, people like brian Sewell And Waldemar januszczak have dismissed your work with contempt as having no artistic value. Weve had a lot of help from our enemies, thats true. But but i am interested in where this feeling of yours comes from, that youre outsiders and that youre against that the whole of the Art World is against you. We never said that. We have enormous support from the Art World. Good heavens were feted wherever we go. You didnt know that . Heres a quote from you, in the Art World, we once said we were thatcherites. It was the worst thing we could say. It was like saying that youre a Nazi Paedophile or something. They will never forgive us for that, you said. The Art World is full of Left Wingers who want to be millionaires. Thats true. Thats still true as well. They all became millionaires. If you say youre conservative to the Taxi Driver or the waiter, its just an opinion. Its only in the Art World they throw up their arms in amazement. Its quite silly. It is interesting. Afterall, we we i mean, we were working class people, starting out with nothing. It was an extraordinary journey that we did. And even that we managed to make an art thats completely different than any other art. And we its our vision. We create a new way of Making Picture for ourselves. And we created whats called the journey that is lived in, confronted lived like conservative or Left Wing or right Wing Or Sexuality or religion that we hate in some big way. We are trite and then, we call it the moral what was it . Moral dimension. The Moral Dimension that we create for ourselves how to behave as a human being. Moral dimension. Thats quite interesting. Over 50 years, youve sort of been in and out of fashion. There was you did have a major retrospective at the tate modern, the leading, sort of, modern Art Gallery In London. But i think im right in saying that pretty much all of the pictures they own of yours, theyre now no longer displayed. Yes. Does it hurt that. . Thats why we create our own space. Because they are all aimed towards different agendas all the time. Mm hm. But the last two years, we did six museum shows. Your journey clearly isnt over, but if i again, to be brutal about it youre both in your 70s now. But we like our public. We like our public. Thats why were doing it. Art for all, we started off with the message in 1968, 69, and we like that journey for the public. We want people in front of our art, we want them to be affected by it. Were confronted by a vision of the world and thats why we like Making Art so much. Gilbert and george, its been fascinating talking to you. Thank you very much for being on hardtalk. Thank you. Very kind. Youre very kind. Clear and calm out there across most of the uk, and Bank Holiday monday promises to be another warm and sunny day. In fact, the temperatures will probably be a degree or so higher. But it wont be sunny absolutely everywhere. An example here from sunday on the scottish coast a lot of Haar And Sea fret out to sea, and we could see a Repeat Performance of that on Bank Holiday monday. This is stubborn cloud, quite often it hugs the coast and sticks around through the course of the day. But inland, its going to be sunny. The Morning Temperatures will be typically around 7 10 degrees in towns and cities. A little bit fresher out in the countryside. So the Morning Cloud will eventually burn back to the coast as we go through the morning, and then its clear Blue Skies pretty much nationwide, apart from the aberdeenshire coastline. Could be only 1a degrees, whereas inland we are talking in the low to mid 20s. Another beautiful Bank Holiday monday on the way. The week ahead, this is tuesday into wednesday, we start to see low pressure developing to the south, but its still far away. That is unsettled weather heading our way, but still On Tuesday well see a lot of fine weather across the uk. A Weather Front just approaching ireland, could be a bit more cloud in northern ireland. But essentially, Little Change for most of us On Tuesday. In fact, the peak of the warmth will see temperatures hitting around 26 celsius. That low edges ever closer during wednesday, and you can see showers approaching south Western Parts of the uk. Could be some thunderstorms around as well, very difficult to say exactly where because they could be hit and miss. But the vast majority of the country again enjoying clear, warm, sunny weather. On wednesday, temperatures easily into the 20s, possibly the mid 20s, and, in scotland, up to around 22 celsius for glasgow and edinburgh. How about beyond wednesday . Looks as though its going to cool off a little bit, but temperatures in some parts of the country will still hover around the 20s, for example in the south. So on the whole, its not looking bad at all. This is bbc news. 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