My Thursday Night

This week there were a number of great art openings in London. My friend and I went to 3 of them.

First was Charming Baker‘s show “The Meaning of Everything” at The Gallery on Redchurch Street. I know they say to save the best for last, but we decided to mix it up and start where I thought we would see the best work. I was right. Charming’s show was extremely cool. For me, his paintings either click and I think they are just fabulous, or they don’t click at all and I think they’re boing. Not much middle ground. Luckily, this show is full of pieces that really click with me. And the prints are extremely well made, which is always nice. I even went back today to check it all out in more detail. My only real criticism would be that the prices seem a bit high, even though the pieces are big. I saw a few works have already sold, so I could be wrong, but I don’t expect the show to sell out. Here are a few of the paintings. Photos are from S-Butterfly, and here is the rest of her set:

Charming Baker Panda Print

Charming Baker Train

Charming Baker Airplane

After the jump, my visits to Stella Dore and The Pure Evil Gallery…Next, we went to Stella Dore. They’ve got a group show going on with 4 new artists. Honestly, wasn’t expecting much from this show, but I was impressed. Unfortunately, I can’t find any photos of this show online just yet and I didn’t have my camera with me. So this will be quick.

Star Child had some work that I was pretty indifferent to. Nothing I would buy, but let’s face it, it’s a hell of a lot more interesting than the crap stencil work that’s been polluting too many group shows in London this past year.

ACE’s work was suprisingly good. I didn’t know how well he would carry over to canvas, but the price was right and there were a few pieces that knock the socks off of most work in that £500 and less range.

And then there was Hin and E C Woodward. I don’t remember which is which, but one’s work looks a lot like I-Lib, another Stella Dore artist. The other’s work is sick. At first, it looks like the boring old “I’m 30 but I draw like a 5 year old” stuff, but then you see that there is this detailed pencil drawing of something like a skeleton hand hidden in the work. Those were cool.

Overall, nice show for cheap work.

Pure Evil Gallery has “Je t’aime” on, which is 5 emerging French artists (Dran, Bom.K, Remy Uno, Jaw and Heng). I think this is the best show that I’ve seen at Pure Evil Gallery.

The sketches by Bom.K and Jaw blew me away as soon as I walked in.

Sketch from Bom.K
Sketch from Bom.K

On top of that, every single artist had at least one piece that I would be more than happy to hang in my house. Here are a couple examples…

Painting by Jaw
Painting by Jaw
Painting by Dran
Painting by Dran

Je T’Aime is another show for impressive paintings with a fairly low price tag.

So that was my Thursday. In a few hours, I’m headed to Venice to see Swoon’s Swimming Cities of Serenissima, Shepard Fairey’s stuff, and the Biennale. Hopefully I’ll have internet in Venice, but if not, Vandalog will be back on Monday.