Tilda Swinton’s Latest Role? A Living Sculpture in Bilbao
At Dom Pérignon’s Révélations event, the actor stood barefoot and silent for “House of Gestures,” a performance staged before Solange Knowles, Alexa Chung, and more.
On the evening of June 4, Tilda Swinton stood barefoot on a stage inside the Guggenheim Bilbao in complete silence for nearly 35 minutes. Wordlessly, she tried on various muslin garments handed to her by assistants nearby—then she’d strike a pose, her elegant and long limbs making shapes against the angular Spanish museum. It was all part of a performance artwork she’d created with fashion historian Olivier Saillard called “House of Gestures,” inspired, in part, by the champagne brand Dom Pérignon. The work was unveiled during the label’s yearly Révélations event—a celebration of the arts staged in far-flung locales. For 2026, the location was Bilbao: the coastal town, which became home to the Frank Gehry-designed museum in 1997, has a rich gastronomic history and a robust permanent collection at the Guggenheim, where visitors around the world come to see artworks by Jean-Michel Basquiat, Jenny Holzer, Richard Serra, and many more.
Thursday night not only marked Swinton’s debut, it was also the celebration for the official launch of four new vintages, a variety of champagne that takes about 20 years to develop. Notably, the Vintage 2018 is chef de cave (“cellar master”) Vincent Chaperon’s first vintage since he started working at Dom Pérignon eight years ago. Of course, Chaperon was on hand in Bilbao to celebrate, as was Solange Knowles, Alexa Chung, and Heated Rivalry actor François Arnaud. They were in the audience watching Swinton’s piece, and attended the subsequent dinner, when the main hall in the Guggenheim was transformed into the chicest spot in the Basque Country (each course was, naturally, paired with one of the new vintages). Knowles and Swinton sat next to each other at the table, which snaked around in loops.
Tilda Swinton and Olivier Saillard
“She’s a renaissance person,” Chaperon told W of tapping Swinton to participate in Révélations—it was actually her second time doing so, having performed a poem at the 2025 event held in London. This time around, “the base of our discussion really appeared in the performance: this notion of place,” Chaperon explained. “The body of Tilda has always been a place—all of her art is based on her body. We thought there was a connection between what she’s doing and the vintages, which are [an example of] permanent reinvention.”
Jacques Giraco, Alexa Chung, and Vincent Chaperon.
Solange Knowles takes in Tilda Swinton’s performance.
The actor even visited the company’s vineyard and abbey in Épernay, France, in 2025—a fantastic year, climatically speaking, said Chaperon. There were “perfect conditions of sun, exposure, and temperature,” which is key for the next batch of vintages that’ll be released in the next eight-or-so years. Each season influences what will happen to future grapes. “This is the unique situation which we are in—present is past, but it is future at the same time,” he added.
