ICNCLST is proud to announce its latest work with Louis Vuitton - ‘White Canvas: LV Trainer in Residence’.

From Louis Vuitton:

The Collection

On 24 February 2023, Louis Vuitton launches ‘White Canvas: LV Trainer in Residence’, a new recurrent collection of limited-edition LV Trainers reinterpreted by renowned artists. Developed by the Maison from an idea initiated by its former Men’s Artistic Director Virgil Abloh, in partnership with Sky Gellatly, ICNCLST CEO the project employs the emblematic all-white leather low-top LV Trainer as a blank canvas for artistic exchange between Louis Vuitton and contemporary artists. An invitation for free expression,the collaboration builds on Louis Vuitton’s historical ties to artistic spheres by evolving its ongoing creative conversations with diverse domains of knowledge and genres.

For the first instalment of ‘White Canvas: LV Trainer in Residence’, Louis Vuitton invites three key artists shaped by the 1980s’ New York underground scene to reinterpret the LV Trainer. Now established names in contemporary art, Lady Pink and Lee Quiñones, and the Estate of the late artist Rammellzee, reinvent the sneaker through the inimitable lenses of their practices. Born in Ecuador in 1964, Lady Pink was a leading participant in the rise of graffiti-based art and remains a cult figure in the hip-hop community. Lee Quiñones – born in Puerto Rico in 1960 – rose to fame painting entire subway cars and murals, and was pivotal in moving street arts above ground. The visual artist Rammellzee (1960-2010) expressed himself in rich artworks across disciplines including painting, sculpture and performance art.

Originally designed by Virgil Abloh for Spring-Summer 2019 – his debut show for Louis Vuitton – the LV Trainer fuses the authentic codes of basketball shoes with the iconography and savoir-faire of the Maison. Conceived by Abloh as the ultimate luxury trainer, it has appeared in a wealth of adaptations across the men’s collection of Louis Vuitton and become an icon in the sneaker community – a mythical status reinforced by the ‘White Canvas: LV in Residence’ project. Now a staple in the men’s collections of the house, the LV Trainer is crafted in leather and comes in low-top and high-top expressions. Each pair of LV Trainer is created in the Maison’s Italian factories in Fiesso d’Artico and requires no less than seven hours of manufacturing.

The Exhibition

The ‘White Canvas: LV Trainer in Residence’ Exhibition From 24 February through 16 March 2023, Louis Vuitton hosts the exhibition ‘White Canvas: LV Trainer in Residence” at Garage Traversi in Milan. The event marks the launch of the collection by the same name, a new initiative through which the Maison welcomes contemporary artists to reinterpret the emblematic LV Trainer through their respective practices. Curated by Sky Gellatly, it unveils the first installment of the project featuring reinterpreted LV Trainers by artists Lady Pink and Lee Quiñones – who will appear at the opening – and the Estate of Rammellzee. The exhibition features the artists’ original hand-painted sneaker adaptations within the context of their works, as well as multi-media installations charting the collaborations. Commercialised versions of the limited-edition LV Trainers will be sold at the venue.

‘White Canvas: LV Trainer in Residence’ was developed by Louis Vuitton from an idea initiated by its former Men’s Artistic Director Virgil Abloh. He asked Sky Gellatly to curate the project; “to elevate a cohort of artists first through exhibition, and then enable extra entré into their oeuvres via collaborative sneakers”. As the CEO and Co-founder of ICNCLST/, a dual-functioning marketing and artist management agency, Gellatly has orchestrated some of the most impactful collaborations in the art world.

With the original LV Trainer adaptations as its focal point, the showcase includes the paintings Celtic Piece by Lady Pink, SPLIT #1 and Tablet 3 by Lee Quiñones, and Incantation of the Queen Bee by Rammellzee as well as the ‘L’ and ‘V’ sculptures from his Letters Racers alphabet. For the opening, Lady Punk and Lee Quiñones will appear in person to each perform a live painting session of vast white canvases, which will remain in the exhibition. Short films chart the sneakers’ transition from hand-crafted artwork to commercialised form, capturing the savoir-faire of Louis Vuitton’s artisans alongside filmed interviews with the artists, while an immersive video-mapping display projects a magnified LV Trainer imagined as a blank canvas with the artworks of the artists.

Inspired by the raw, industrial galleries of the New York environment inherent to the artists’ practices, the exhibition takes place in Garage Traversi in Piazza San Babila in Milan. Built in the 1930s by architects Giuseppe De Min and Alessandro Rimini, the space was the first fully-automated car garage in Italy. Recently restored to house an ephemeral Louis Vuitton store while the Maison’s Via Montenapoleone flagship undergoes refurbishment, it previously featured a showcase dedicated to Louis Vuitton’s Yayoi Kusama collaboration. Milan was chosen for the ‘White Canvas’ exhibition as a celebration of Louis Vuitton’s expert Italian factories in Fiesso d’Artico where the LV Trainer is manufactured.

The commercialized versions of the three limited-edition LV Trainers will launch on the opening day of the exhibition and will be exclusively sold at the store for the duration of the showcase.

Louis Vuitton ‘White Canvas: LV Trainer in Residence’