1967 Gilbert and George meet at Saint Martin’s School of Art and Design in London. George describes it as “love at first sight”. The two young sculptors soon begin seeing themselves as “living sculptures”.

1968 Gilbert & George rent a room on 12 Fournier Street in the East End, then a run-down outskirt. Years later they buy the building, making it their home, studio and a part of their art.

1969 Gilbert & George send hundreds of handmade post cards. Neatly printed is the artists’ home address and later on, also their phone number. Hardly anyone calls.

1969 Gilbert & George come across an old record with Flanagan and Allen singing the famous ditty “Underneath the Arches”. “That’s it, this is us” was their immediate reaction.

1969 ”The magazine Studio International censored two offending words in our first ‘Magazine Sculpture’, George the Cunt and Gilbert the Shit. We realized that we were on the right track.” – Gilbert & George

1972 Gin and tonic is the duo’s favourite cocktail. They chose Gordon’s because it is “the best”. The brand is considered hopelessly unfashionable at the time.

1977 “We left our house. We opened the door and went into the world. And what did we see? Big piles of shit! Big piles. And we saw all this aggression. The world was in turmoil.“ – Gilbert & George

1981 “We wanted to put everything we could think of, everything we knew, everything we dreaded, everything we hoped, everything we loved, everything in.” – Gilbert & George

1984 In the 1980s, AIDS was a new and terrifying disease. The tabloids ran alarming headlines about “the gay plague”. Many friends of Gilbert & George are diagnosed with the terminal disease.

1990 As part of a new openness in Russia, controversial Western artists are invited to exhibit their works in Moscow for the first time. The Soviet Union collapses the following year.

1994 Gilbert & George achieve technical perfection with their unique printing process. Their images are composed from detailed sketches. The result appears only when each image is developed and assembled.

1998 “Our cities, your tears, their money, the rain, our sexuality, your sweat, their views are all in THE RUDIMENTARY PPICTURES.” – Gilbert & George

2003 Negatives, fixatives and darkrooms are replaced with computers. Gilbert & George unsentimentally change technique, and the only thing they miss is the rubber gloves, which are no longer needed.

2008 “An encyclopedia of altered states: the lucid dreams of shamanic vaudevillians, drawn from the streets of East London” – Michael Bracewell on JACK FREAK PICTURES, comprising 153 pieces

2013 ”We took it from a sticker, I think: ‘Why are people scapegoating Islam?’. But also because everyone is scapegoating each other.” – George on the title SCAPEGOATING

2016 “We see it as an exploration of our modern times. You switch on the news and you see barbed wire and bearded people.” – Gilbert & George on the series BEARD PICTURES