Tracey Emin @ Louis Vuitton

I braved Louis Vuitton's new(ish) shop on Bond Street yesterday to have a snoop at the Tracey Emin  curated book shelf  in the 'Louis Vuitton Librarie'. To be honest it's a thoroughly intimidating experience, with about 702 staff greeting you emphatically as you enter the vastly spacious shiny, glitteringly gold and twinkling 3 floor store - light bounces off seemingly every surface: the floor to ceiling mirrors, gold chains, polished-to-within-an-inch-of-their-lives surfaces - buckles, glass cabinets, patent shoes and bags, watches, sparkling jewellery. It's the epitome of indulgently luxurious retail heaven, a sort of cloying, claustrophobic, decadent shopping overload that attacks you from every angle an inveigles itself into your soul. on the first floor though is the fabled Librarie, where there are a series of shelves that act as an art installation cum cultural shopping experience... artists curate a wall of books that have helped shape their lives, influenced their work and that they've written. It's a curious creation that works surprisingly well. Tracey Emin's books include, amongst others, a healthy smattering of Amistead Maupin, Graeme Green's The End of The Affair, Raymond Carver's What We talk About When We Talk About Love; A.A.Milne's Winnie the Pooh; Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Truman Capote; Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky; Laughter in the Dark by Vladimir Nabokov, plus a few of her own books. You can buy any of those on display. Sort of beats 'Waterstone's recommends', at any rate.
TRACEY EMIN AT LOUIS VUITTON LIBRAIRIE
12 October - 30 November 2010