To Newport Street Gallery! …in between dodging rain showers whilst trying to watch a cricket match in early September. GAWD bless Newport Street Gallery. It serves as something of a more than half-decent outpost whenever it’s pissing it down at The Oval.

Exhibiting right now is These Thoughts May Disappear by Jack White. Yep, THAT Jack White. You almost felt as though you should be wearing red and black to enter the gallery space.

We would have stood out if we were. NPS was absolutely empty on Wednesday lunchtime. We pretty much had a private viewing to ourselves.

It’s always a pleasure visiting Newport Street. I still find it pretty amazing that such a contemporary and free space has opened up around the back of Lambeth Walk.

We’ve made our way into the first gallery. Fans of Ukulele Joe won’t be disappointed.

Jack White has used some fancy 3D printing to create exact replicas of a charity shop Ukulele Joe he picked up. Each one has been decorated in a different style.

It’s easy to criticise the idea of a rich rock star turning to art, having the financial security to back them up, But given the chance you would, right?

We kept on wandering. A load of old garden pallets had then been tarted up in a second gallery space. Black and red feature heavily. I’m not sure what paint material was used but they were pleasingly shiny and fresh.

A theme then began to develop of old junk being upholstered. Jack White then tells the story through the exhibition guide of how, before he became a rich rock star, he worked as an upholster.

The legend goes that he was just more than a stitch-up and makeup type of fella. He dropped in secret messages within the inner workings of the furniture he was restoring. There were strong KLF vibes taking place here. I had the urge to sit down on some of the furniture.

You know you’re in a fancy art gallery when all the artwork is available to purchase, but the disclaimer is you have to fill in an application form. I don’t think Jack White wants to sell to any old amateur collector.

The highlight for me was the collection of old White Stripe amps that had been customised by some guest artists. No surprise to see Shepard Fairey and Damien Hirst adding their trademark licks to the amps.

This was also quite an interactive gallery space. You got to play various keyboards and even a theremin that came through the amps. This was tremendous fun.

I absolutely bloody love NPS. It’s a perfect gallery space to exhibit for one artist. You can spend quite easily half an hour in there taking in what is on show. You never feel overwhelmed and you never feel that you have been under-changed even though it’s free, natch.

I wasn’t expecting a big security guard geezer and a bag check ahead of entering the Duncan Grant exhibition at Firstsite. Sadly some of the right-wing nut jobs have taken offence to the idea of homosexuality being celebrated in art form, dickheads. The broad theme for the exhibition is the changing ways some LGBTQ+ people find one another online and offline. Truth be told it’s pretty average art.

There was some X-rated action behind closed doors where you were given plenty of warning about what you might see. The artwork itself was hardly shocking. If anyone is going to take offence then it might be from the potty-mouth profanity coming out of a PA system. I couldn’t see what all the fuss is about to be honest.

What We Did During the Plague at the Minories in Sunny Colch was half decent. It’s a retrospective exhibition of the work produced by Phil Jupitus during those weird lockdown days. It shows his unique approach to collages using Polaroids and creating custom postcards for his pals. There’s a lot to take in with over 100 pieces of work. The detail changes within each postcard but the format and formula remain the same. I just about got all the cultural reference points.

A little random quayside wandering, and we stumbled upon the opening of the summer season down at The Notage. There is a three-week run with the local artist Ernest Turner. It’s a name I’m familiar with, if not the artwork itself.

As ever with The Notage, the exhibition is very quirky, with random display boards laid out on the top floor. If you’re looking for a Newport Street Gallery minimalist experience, then probably turn away now.

We didn’t turn away though. The artwork and the random nature of the exhibits was rather appealing. Plus there wasn’t too much detail about Ernest, something which is always a bonus for me in these exhibitions. I want to look at the art, and not read an essay.

The brief bio details that were available explained how Ernest Turner was born in Wivenhoe in 1899. He came from a well-established Wivenhoe family. His father was a shipwright and his uncle was Captain Albert Turner, a professional yacht captain.

The term used in the exhibition to describe his style was naive. I’m not sure if this is a piss take or not. There was definitely an element of not really wanting to be an artist and creating his work as something of a hobby.

This gives a great injustice to the quality and playfulness of the work on show.

The story continued explaining how once Ernest had retired from working in the shipping industry himself, he took up the paintbrush. Initially he wanted to paint for money. Soon he became rather decent and managed to sell all over Europe.

This coincided with the town itself undergoing a major shift from the industrial to the more arty and academic. The small paintings created by Ernest capture a certain playfulness as you see this transition taking place in front of you.

Sculptures are also included. It was pleasing to see some ships in bottles forming part of the exhibition.

His body of work is a great snapshot of local history. It documents the boats of Wivenhoe and elsewhere along the estuary. It’s also some of the rarer moments where you can see the old Crab and Winkle line being captured as it shuttles along from Wivenhoe to Brightlingsea. That Dr Beeching was an absolute bastard.

Ernest died in 1977. The paintings on show at the Nottage are a wonderful memory of a town that has long since changed.

We popped into The Minories whilst in Sunny Colch. I would hesitate to call it an art trail, but being right next door to Firstsite, and well, it would be rude not to have an extra serving of art or arse.

The current Anglian Abstract exhibition is very much of the art variety, rather than the anal. It celebrates modernism in East Anglia. This is a landscape that is often captured in watercolours, and not rigid, geometrical patterns. Anglian Abstract adds a little balance.

Many of the works on show are either models, or 3D in presentation. The artwork leaps out at you, not waiting for you to chin stroke and come up with some crap about what it represents.

It all felt very earthly, even for a medium that can be cold in outlook. It all felt very analogue and not of the modern world, despite the modernism tag.

Artwork with straight lines can work wonders for an OCD obsessed amateur art critic.

Sue Webster’s Birth of an Icon at Firstsite has the type of bombastic exhibition title that you would expect from a confident artist. Tell It Like It Is, etc. Thankfully she just about gets away with it.

Birth of an Icon is no doubt a little playful, a tongue in cheek description to herald her first major solo exhibition. It comes right out of the punk playbook that the exhibition celebrates.

Basically it’s an exhibition spread over four gallery spaces, documenting how the first four Banshee albums shaped the artist. There’s some incredible detail with the various artefacts on show.

The main gallery walls resembles the contents of your loft being carefully curated and put on full public show. It’s a timeline of late 70’s, early 80’s post-punk culture, all presented in not quite a lineal style.

What works really well is the orange string that joins up the dots. It can be confusing at first, but it makes all the connections, showing how different artists, scenes and experiences are all related.

I worked my way along the timeline, surprised to see that Bowie was nowhere to be seen. Ah, don’t worry; there he is in some of the few, final spaces, showing how he helps to hang it all together.

The second gallery space has a stunning collection of DIY punk leather jackets, all bastardised showing love for the Banshees. A third room has some self-portraits of the artist whilst pregnant in her 50’s. The final space was a little too happy clappy for me with scented candles.

Oh - and I bloody loved the Crazyhead reference.

What the chuff am I doing in the epicentre of the Mayfair high art world, knocking on a majestic front door, asking to enter a gallery?

Erm…

And so I made my way over to Woodbury House on a recommendation to see the Lee Quiñones exhibition.

You might know Lee from his work and starring role in the Wild Style film back in 1982.

I can recall watching in at the old Odeon back in Nottingham, hanging on to every last detail of the emerging hip hop scene, and seeing how I could transfer this to my own teenage stylings.

I still have no regrets about wearing the ski goggles for a Wear Your Own Clothes day at school.

And that really should have been it for Lee and I. Hip hop burnt out for me when I stopped breakin'. I confess that I haven’t followed his career since.

KNOCK KNOCK.

“Can I help you?”

Erm, I’ve come to view the gallery.

“Are you a collector?”

I hesitated in saying YES! I specialise in cheapo Ebay CD’s and knock off Forest kits.

I somehow managed to blag myself into Woodbury House. Actually, it wasn’t that difficult.

The host was an absolute charmer. She knew her art, and genuinely seemed interested in to what had led me over to Mayfair.

There was little misunderstanding as I tried to explain that it was a Big Issue article sent over to me by Wifey.

The host mentioned that Wifey had been in the gallery only last week. I explained that this most definitely wasn’t the case, unless the gallery was hosting a chepo golf clothes sale.

I was given a brief introduction to the work of Lee, starting with Wild Style. This was, until now, my start and end point.

I was given the freedom of the gallery to explore, with no other viewers - or collectors - around.

This is something of a back to front exhibition. You enter the gallery with Lee’s more contemporary work, and then make your way over to Wild Style at the back of the space.

You can see how his work has progressed over the years, taking in various cultural reference points for each period, and then adding his own interpretation.

The overall message of the exhibition title - Outside is America - runs throughout. The work documents an outsider view of the States, and in particular, one viewed through the prism of race.

Sadly it’s a theme that has given him plenty of scope over the decades.

The only thing missing from the exhibition is some form of soundtrack. But then that might have been a little annoying with the same tracks played over again on loop.

Woodbury House is a most welcoming space. The work of Lee Quiñones was worth making the trip over to Mayfair to view.

I might even start collecting, if I can find the spare £25k or so floating around down the back of the settee.

Sometimes the best recommendations to satisfy your cultural thirst come from right on your own local doorstep.

OH HAI Brixton Buzz.

And so with a spare half hour in Clap’ham, I swerved the brunching Wankerville hordes and headed to the local library to look at the work of Brixton street photographer Christopher iCha.

The X-Factor exhibition is low key, but lovely all the same, It features many recognisable Brixton faces. The enthusiasm for the subject matter comes across clearly.

A mixture of black & white and colour snaps are on display as you make your way down the spiralling - and bloody awful - structure of Clapham Library.

There’s no great fanfare telling you about the exhibition. The photos blend in with what is already quite a busy interior landscape.

Framed behind glass in a very bright building, they’re also impossible to snap yourself, with endless lens glare.

That’s no bad thing. It’s a little cheeky to take photos of photos, often leading to a poor secondhand reproduction.

It’s clear from the first frame on show that iCha has the complete trust of his subject matter. He’s not capturing Brixton scenes - he is PART of the Brixton street life.

If you can manage this then you’re halfway there to capturing some decent portrait photography.

It’s an incredibly positive, and very playful exhibition. It will serve as a wonderamful historical archive of the Brixton scene in ten, twenty years time.

Clapham Library itself is very odd. It was built on the back of a developer, wanting to flog on luxury apartments up above. The library looks and feels like an afterthought.

The spiralling nature of the building means that you make your way down to the basement on basically a giant helter skelter walking ramp. It has aged badly over the past fifteen years or so.

Never trust round buildings - and yep, I’ve worked in one.

I can’t remember where I first got the hat tip for the excellent Brown Collection over in Marylebone. Maybe it was from Londonist?

And so I found myself on a miserable, wet Soho afternoon, kicking about with an hour or so to spare.

The record shop circuit (and budget) had been exhausted. I couldn’t be arsed to hit the BOOZE.

Hey! How about that freebie gallery that I have a vague recollection of a recommendation?

It’s a ten minute cut through from the West End and around the back streets of Marylebone. Look out for the Mews, and then WOH! Won’t you look at that.

What a BEAUT.

The building itself is a work of art. Beautifully restored as a town house period piece of architecture, yet still effortlessly blending in with burgeoning wine and dine scene around these parts.

I was wet, wearing a pair of stomping red cherry DM’s and looking a little distressed tbh. I wasn’t your typical Art Gallery Circuit Wanker.

I was welcomed in my the most polite of young fellas. I visibly made an effort of stamping my size 8’s on the matting, not wanting to drag half of the wet Soho shit into the space.

Erm, what next?

My host knew exactly what the score was.

“Have you visited before?”

Nope.

“Do you know anything about Glenn Brown?”

I made my apologies.

“How much time do you have?”

I think my answer of half an hour or so wasn’t too cheeky, or too imposing either.

“PERFECT!”

…said my host.

It was explained how Glenn Brown founded the gallery with his husband Edgar Laguinia. The aim is to showcase Brown’s work (and why not?) alongside other artists of a similar style and perspective.

I then heard a little more about how Brown’s own work concentrates on the finer details and brush strokes, often to reveal secondary images within the overall canvas.

This technique has a specific name in the art world. I’ve forgotten it, as I was a little concerned that my wet DM’s were now leaving a slight puddle on the immaculate wooden flooring.

Apologies, Mr B.

Magnifying glasses are available across all four floors of the gallery. Visitors are encourage to focus in on the finer detail - a nice touch.

I was then let loose to do my thing. Immediately I was drawn, so to speak, to the Austin Osman Spare artworks. He has a specific place in contemporary Transpontine architecture.

Elsewhere and the work was as stunning as the surrounds. I think I might have just found my Nu Fave Art Gallery.

The lush, bright colours of Brown contrasted well with the under-stated decors of each gallery. Each floor had sufficient space to maintain my interest without getting bored.

The current Hoi Polloi exhibition displays work of the “great unwashed masses.” It was nowhere near as insulting as the title might suggest.

The cellar containing sculptures was a particular fave. The space itself is remarkable. You can hear and feel the vibrations of the Victoria Line running underneath.

Next time it rains in Soho, I’ll know exactly where to wander.

The new V&A Storehouse East - aka the World’s Largest Jumble Sale.

Harsh.

Sure, it’s not tat. It’s high end value items - apart from the West Ham 1980’s kids kit.

The Moulton F-Frame was to be admired, as was some of the social history from the Robin Hood Gardens estate.

But there was little context or explanation, unless you wanted to have your face stuck in your phone via the QR code.

I get the idea that it’s a lofty space. Build high, etc. It’s tricky to display items without stacking them up.

Voyeurism is quite a fetish, Comrades.