Following the Fondation Louis Vuitton’s commitment to mount international projects and reach a broader audience by presenting holdings of the Collection abroad, the Espace Louis Vuitton Tokyo introduces Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore feat. Big Red SoundSystem, which showcases two major works by British artist Mark Leckey. This show thus takes part of the Fondation’s “Hors-les-murs” programme, which unfolds at the Espaces Louis Vuitton in Tokyo, Munich, Venice, Beijing, Seoul and Osaka.

Mark Leckey belongs to the generation of Young British Artists (including such creators as Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin and Sarah Lucas), a movement created in London, United Kingdom, by the end of the 1980s. He nevertheless nearly vanished from the artistic scene in the 1990s, returning only at the end of the decade. The topic of the artist’s place in society – and, more specifically, in the cultural industry – is central for Leckey. Recently, new technologies and the information-access revolution have been at the genesis of several of his works. His performance / presentation The Long Tail (2009) arose from the “long tail” concept developed by British-American author Chris Anderson in 2004, a theory asserting that, with the vastness of internet-facilitated distribution, marginal consumption desires can also be sources of profit. Similarly, Leckey’s fascination with humans’ coexistence with the consumer objects around them led him to suggest an expanded idea of sculpture, an animist practice based on communication with industrial artifacts.

Heir to a fin-de-siècle dandyism dovetailing life and art in the vein of Oscar Wilde or Joris-Karl Huysmans, an extension of Charles Baudelaire’s “painter of modern life,” Leckey views his immediate environment as a tool and source of inspiration. He rejects the notion of art disconnected from everyday experience. Traveling through the history of Britain’s subcultures between the 1970s and 1990s, his work can only truly be appreciated when popular cultures are viewed as noble, worthy of interest and sources of genuine works of art. The video Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore (1999), actually marking his return to the art scene with great fanfare, exemplifies his interest in popular cultures and their do-it-yourself approach. Founder of music bands donAteller and Jack Too Jack, the artist sees rave music as an intense form of artistic expression, one he celebrates with gigantic speaker walls (SoundSystems, 2001-2003). Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore with SoundSystem (10-year Anniversary Remaster) (1999-2003-2010), presented in this exhibition, perfectly synthesizes this approach by mixing these two earlier works.

Drawing inspiration from his cultural and material environment, Leckey’s world is obviously online and digital, made up of cybernetic and bionic technologies. He talks about it through his own obsessions, often objects that he uses in his work. “I’m a fetishist, I fetishize things, and I’m drawn to these things and I’m obsessed about these things and I need to possess them in some way, because I feel like they are possessing me. I want some kind of reciprocation,” he explains. Therefore, embracing the cartoon character Felix the Cat (2013), Leckey makes this specific figure his own: the first subject to be televised in 1928, thus appropriating this pioneer symbol of the digital era.

About the Fondation Louis Vuitton
The Fondation Louis Vuitton serves the public interest and is exclusively dedicated to contemporary art and artists, as well as 20th-century works to which their inspirations can be traced. The Collection and the exhibitions it organizes seek to engage a broad public. The magnificent building created by the Canadian-American architect Frank Gehry, and already recognized as an emblematic example of the 21st-century architecture, constitutes the Fondation’s seminal artistic statement. Since its opening in October 2014, the Fondation has welcomed more than ten million visitors from France and around the world.
The Fondation Louis Vuitton commits to engage in international initiatives, both at the Fondation and in partnership with public and private institutions, including other foundations and museums such as the Pushkin Museum in Moscow and the Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg (Icons of Modern Art. The Shchukin Collection in 2016 and The Morozov Collection in 2021), the MoMA in New York (Being Modern: MoMA in Paris), and the Courtauld Institute of Art in London (The Courtauld Collection. A Vision for Impressionism) among others. The artistic direction also developed a specific “Hors-les-murs” programme taking place within the Espaces Louis Vuitton in Tokyo, Munich, Venice, Beijing, Seoul and Osaka, which are exclusively devoted to exhibitions of works from the Collection. These exhibitions are open to the public free of charge and promoted through specific cultural communication.