LOUIS VUITTON “WHITE CANVAS: LV TRAINER IN RESIDENCE” THE EXHIBITION IN MILAN UNTIL MARCH 16

Louis Vuitton presents “White Canvas: LV Trainer in Residence,” an exhibition dedicated to the first collection of a new series of artistic reinterpretations of the LV Trainer in which three limited editions of the iconic sneaker created in collaboration with artists Lady Pink, Lee Quiñones and the Estate of Rammellzee will be presented. The creations, which are the first installment of an artistic exchange program dedicated to the LV Trainer, will be on display at Louis Vuitton’s Garage Traversi store in Milan until March 16, 2023. On the occasion of the exhibition, LV Trainers will be available exclusively in the Milan space in limited quantities.

Developed by the Maison from an idea by former Men’s Artistic Director Virgil Abloh, in collaboration with Sky Gellatly, the project sees the iconic leather LV Trainer used as a blank canvas for artistic exchange between Louis Vuitton and the artists involved. The collaboration, an invitation to the free expression of creativity, builds on Louis Vuitton’s historical ties to art and the evolution of its ongoing creative conversations in different fields and cultural contexts.

For the first installment of “White Canvas: LV Trainer in Residence,” Louis Vuitton invites three celebrated artists from New York’s 1980s underground scene to reinterpret the LV Trainer.

Well-established names in contemporary art, Lady Pink and Lee Quiñones, and the late artist Summer Rommellzee, reinvent the sneaker through the gaze of their aesthetic. Born in Ecuador in 1964, Lady Pink was at the forefront of the rise of graffiti-based art and remains a cult figure in the hip-hop community. Lee Quiñones, born in Puerto Rico in 1960, became famous by painting entire subway cars and creating murals. visual artist Rammellzee (1960-2010) has expressed himself in works of art spanning multiple disciplines, including painting, sculpture, and performance art.

Originally designed by Virgil Abloh for Spring-Summer 2019, his first runway show for Louis Vuitton, the LV Trainer fuses the original basketball shoe codes with the iconography and savoir-faire of the Maison. Conceived by Abloh as the ultimate luxury trainer, it has appeared in a plethora of adaptations in Louis Vuitton’s men’s collection and has become an icon for sneaker fans, a status reinforced by the “White Canvas: LV Trainer in Residence” project.

Inspired by the raw, industrial galleries of the New York environment, the exhibition takes place in the former Traversi Garage in Milan’s Piazza San Babila. Built in the 1930s by architects Giuseppe De Min and Alessandro Rimini, the space was the first fully automated car garage in Italy. The space was recently restored to house the temporary Lovis Vuitton store during the major Via Montenapoleone expansion works, and hosted an exhibition dedicated to Louis Vuitton’s collaboration with Yayoi Kusama at its opening. Milan was chosen for the exhibition “White Canvas: [V Trainer in Residence” to celebrate the savoir-faire of the artisans at Louis Vuitton’s Italian ateliers in Fiesso d’Artico, where the LV Trainer is created.