The Urethra Postcard Art of Gilbert and George

There’s a fun half hour to be had at the Gilbert and George exhibition of postcard art at the White Cube gallery in St James. The exhibition is of dozens of collages of identical size, each consisting of 12 postcards arranged in a square with a thirteenth in the centre. The postcards have been collected over the years either from telephone kiosks, where they usually have something to do with transexual sex, or from shops selling tourist tat, where the theme is London and the union flag.

 As usual with Gilbert and George it’s the seedier side of London presented with wit and panache.

The collages are hopelessly expensive, but there’s a bargain to be had in the catalogue which is a beautiful production of more than a thousand pages in two volumes, the second of which covers their postcard art between 1972 and 1989. The cover price is only £40, which must be a fraction of what it cost to produce. And each volume is signed by the artists “With love and best wishes”.
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One word of warning, don’t buy them if like me you need to walk across London to meet someone for lunch- they weigh about three stone.