Car bomb found in central London

A car bomb planted in central London would have caused "carnage" if it had exploded, police sources have said. Officers carried out a controlled explosion on the device left in the busy Haymarket area of the capital. More.

Hannah Starkey @ ICA

At first glance, the staged tableaux of British photographer Hannah Starkey might look like something you'd find in a high-end fashion magazine. Look past the gloss, however, and a disturbing universe populated by isolated young women slowly reveals itself. Though these carefully constructed works are notoriously difficult to interpret, you can get a peek into the artist's mind tonight when she discusses her work and inspirations with Charlotte Cotton. As a bonus, keep an eye out for previews of Starkey's first full-cover monograph, due to be published later this summer.

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Chris Coekin @ The Photographer's Gallery

Inspired by the beatniks, Chris Coekin hitchhiked around the UK for six sporadic years. Armed with a disposable camera and cardboard signs, Coekin relied entirely on the kindness of strangers for modes of transportation. Photographs of his journeys feature action self-portraits, roadside scenery and the drivers who gave him lifts; but it's Coekin's central focus on the breakdown of trust in society that subtly emerges throughout, via thematic images that range from physiognomical portraits of motorists to snapshots of roadkill.

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iTunes Festival @ ICA

The debut iTunes festival is your chance to see 60 bands and musicians play intimate gigs at the ICA — absolutely free. Acts range from new festival stalwarts such as Amy Winehouse and Paolo Nutini to fiercely fashionable image-makers Jack Penate and the Rakes, along with reliable indie vets including Ash and Travis. Free tickets are available to competition winners via the festival website, but even if you miss out the first time, iTunes promise that all shows will be available to download.

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Igor Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring @ Royal Festival Hall

When Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring premiered in Paris in 1913, the audience rioted — the classical ballet world was not yet ready for a story of pagan sacrifice. Mores may have relaxed since then, but with its discordant, unpredictable rhythms, the composer's score remains notoriously difficult to choreograph. Digital artist Klaus Obermaier's cyber choreography of the cycle, however, offers a bold 21st-century interpretation: through 3D glasses, viewers witness a technologically manipulated piece that distorts solo dancer Julia Mach's actual movements. With the music performed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra and conducted by Marin Alsop, tonight also includes renditions of Philip Glass' Prelude from Akhnaten and Edgard Varèse's Arcana.

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Inside Notting Hill

Rachman, Profumo, Marley, Malcolm X, Hugh Grant... They've all left their mark on London's Trustafarian suburb says the author of a guide.

I’d been nagged for years to do an update of Inside Notting Hill – a book I’d first published under the imprint Portobello Publishing in 2001. The first edition had been an instant success and had much positive press coverage – but it had been hard work.

After its British success, and in part due to the popularity of the film Notting Hill, we decided to have a launch party in New York. The date we chose was September 11, 2001. And although several people came to the party – it seemed so trivial to be plugging Notting Hill that the book was never the success in America that it might have been.

Self-publishing is certainly easier now than it was, but there are so many details to think about when you are both writing and publishing. Conventionally there is an author, an agent and a publisher who has many different departments: production, accounts, marketing, designing, editing, proof-reading, photo research, publicity and distribution. My co-author Miranda Davies and myself did hire a designer and a style-editor but otherwise took on all these tasks ourselves.

This time round I have used the imprint Umbrella Books – as in the interim another publisher called Portobello Books has started and I didn’t want people to get confused – they are much bigger than me. Our book celebrates the diversity of Notting Hill – we published it initially to show that there was much more to the neighbourhood than the film – indeed there is an entire piece on films made in the area dating back to Powell and Pressburger’s 1948 film Red Shoes.

The book is really many books in one – the first section is walks through the area, with detailed descriptions of churches and other landmarks followed by annotated listings of shops, bars and restaurants. The second section has chapters on music, Carnival and film followed by one on history. The music scene in Notting Hill, includes among others Pink Floyd, Hawkwind, Bob Marley and the Clash.

The Carnival, now a massive event that attracts people from all over the world, started in the early 1960s with children of all races parading the streets dressed as folk heroes. The name Notting Hill probably derives from the Saxon ‘sons of Cnotta’ who settled in the area around AD 700 - there is little evidence of the Saxon past but what is very apparent, as one walks round the streets, is that Notting Hill was one of the most grandiosely conceived suburbs in the country.

The fourth section has extracts from a cross-section of writings dating from Lady Mary Coke’s 1774 description of an occasion in her usually peaceful Holland House garden: “I have had another vexation that never happen’d to me before, the having of a pack of hounds in my garden, & several men on Horseback broke into my grounds … ” up to an extract about the late-lamented Fresh and Wild in Westbourne Grove from Rachel Johnson’s 2006 novel Notting Hell.

Osbert Lancaster, who was born in Elgin Crescent, remembers: "At that time Elgin Crescent … was situated on the Marches of respectability. Up the hill to the south, tree-shaded and freshly stuccoed, stretched the squares and terraces of the last great stronghold of Victorian propriety: below to the north lay the courts and alleys of Notting Dale, through which, so my nurse terrifyingly assured me, policemen could only proceed in pairs."

The fortunes of Notting Hill have fluctuated wildly: in the 1950s and 1960s Rachman was one of the more notorious landlords and much of the area was a slum and the Profumo Affair was just one of the events of the 1960s that kept the neighbourhood on the map.

Among other extracts Virginia Ironside has written about Anna Kavan who lived in Hillsleigh Road: "It was a perfect place for her to live: to the south was genteel Kensington, with the department stores and retired upper-class couples taking their walks in Kensington Gardens; to the north was Notting Hill, a run-down area, where recent immigrants from the West Indies struggled to survive in overcrowded, dilapidated housing."

John Michell describes the times when Michael X hung out in the Grove: "The Grove, as it was then called, stretching from Ladbroke Grove eastwards towards Paddington, had never been a fashionable district, and by the end of the war it was partly derelict. Rooms and flats in its crumbling houses were among the cheapest in London".

What a contrast to Rachel Johnson’s lifestyle descriptions of Westbourne Grove in the 21st century: "I hear one say to the other that she's so into this place because they have all the best stuff, and when something sprouts, 'It’s, like, at the peak of its life force and energy'. I make a mental note that people talk about wholefood these days in just the same reverential and boring way they used to talk about Ecstasy in the 1980s."

The pieces we have chosen for the book show Notting Hill in all its rich diversity and with its history and up-to-date listings we hope that it will be of interest and use to many people.

For more information: http://www.umbrellabooks.com/

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Shoreditch House is going to be Britain’s hottest new club

The hipsters of the East End take some persuading – but it looks like Shoreditch House is going to be Britain’s hottest new club.

The arrival of Nick Jones’s Soho House group in London’s oh-so-Noughties East End was not a wholly simple affair. With the original Soho House – opened in 1995, in Soho – now synonymous with vodka-and-tonic-swilling media types, and its Notting Hill outpost, the Electric, heaving with BlackBerry-toting movie princesses (male and female), some people had started to feel that the brand was a little stale.

How did he expect such a complacent, commercial group to slip seamlessly into Britain’s hippest neighbourhood? You can put as many bowling alleys as you like in your venue, or rooftop swimming pools, zinc-topped bars, City views, billiard tables and the world’s longest Chesterfield (it’s 52ft long, cost £35,000 and is covered in mustard mohair), but the cool crowd won’t buy in if they think it’s full of the wrong people.

Lulu Kennedy, director of Fashion East, an organisation that supports up-and-coming young designers, is one of the ringleaders of the East End’s creative revival and exactly the sort of customer the new Shoreditch House needed. Jones, in signature style, threw a bash. “They had this hard-hat party while it was still a building site,” Kennedy says. “I got chatting to a few people and, by the end of the evening, they had asked if I would be part of it.” Buoyed by the conviviality of it all, not to mention Jones’s trademark charm, Kennedy joined the committee on the spot.

Jones has spent £6m turning two floors of a former tea warehouse on Bethnal Green Road into his sixth members’ club (he also owns several other sites, from spas to cinemas, that are open to the public and has clubs planned for everywhere from Miami to Istanbul). He claims he could have made much more money with a chain of brasseries. “But it’s not about money; it’s about interesting people,” he insists. “Just because we’re getting bigger, I don’t think we are diluting anything. There are so many interesting people about. I’ve never thought of what I do in terms of exclusivity. I think in terms of space. And the more sites we open, the more space our members have.”

Of course, Soho House is exclusive. With only 1,000 memberships available for Shoreditch House (all now sold) and a total worldwide membership of 12,000, your Soho House member is still a rare breed. Where Jones has got it right is in courting genuine ELTs (east-London types) such as Sandra Esqulant, the landlady of the YBA hangout the Golden Heart, in Spitalfields, for 30 years. “The east-London crowd are quite a protective bunch,” says the club’s membership secretary, Sophie Siegle. “It’s a real community. They wouldn’t have accepted anyone meddling with the DNA of the place.”

Some of the biggest names in British art and fashion are now on board, including Jake and Dinos Chapman, Giles Deacon, Roland Mouret, Tim Noble, Sue Webster, Rachel Whiteread and Conrad Shawcross. Initial fears that the club would sound the death knell for the area by bringing in hordes of vibe-killing suits have proved unfounded. “The only City people we have are in because they are married to the right people,” says Matthew Clark, director of the ad agency Mother, who introduced Jones to the building. “Besides, there is money in Shoreditch. It’s just not ostentatious City money. There are lots of small companies, independent spirits, doing well over here. That’s the magic of the place.”

The interior has been designed by Tom Dixon. “We were all terrified by this enormous space,” he says. “We wanted to preserve the rawness that is intrinsic not just to the building but to the area as well.

Hopefully, we have maintained something of the spirit of the east – although I was hoping to include an element of the Bengali community with a Bollywood screening room or restaurant. But Nick wasn’t going for that.”

For Lulu Kennedy, as happy swapping gossip with Esqulant as she is sitting front row at fashion shows, “It’s lovely to have a place where you can wear a nice dress without someone spilling lager over it. There aren’t many places you can go on a luxury spree in the east of London. A lot of sexy places get taken over too quickly by the out-of-townies.”

Now, her big concern is whether she will be allowed to go topless by the rooftop pool. “There’s room for all sorts of things in east London,” she says, “and I’ll be very disappointed if that’s not one of them.”

Shoreditch House opens tomorrow: www.shoreditchhouse.com

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Yo, Yotel arrives at Gatwick

Yotel, a Japanese-style ‘capsule hotel’ opening next week is the hip new way to kip at Gatwick airport.

The Japanese capsule hotel (coffin-like rooms stacked one on top of the other) was invented as ultra-cheap accommodation for office workers who “miss” the last train home – that’s code for get blind drunk. Next week, the concept gets a Cinderella makeover and lands at Gatwick, ready to welcome those who fear they might miss their flight. That’s not code for anything – we fun-loving Brits are simply terribly anxious about the airport experience these days.

While the Asian template is not completely without style, its less-than-salubrious image has obscured an eminently sensible proposition: sometimes you just need somewhere to lay your head. That, coupled with the 21st century’s fascination with nanotechnology – teeny phones, mini music systems, those cute little Blackberry keyboards – has made miniature marketable and means hoteliers are ready to gamble that trendy techie travellers won’t mind booking into a box.

Enter Yotel. Seven square metres of glamorous Conran-designed interiors and the stated aim of becoming the iPod of the hotel industry. A claim that is being taken seriously, because Yotel is the brainchild of the team behind Yo! Sushi, the company that made raw fish fashionable in a land that used to favour battered cod.

The Gatwick prototype opens next Sunday, and another will follow at Heathrow before the year’s end, but the company doesn’t intend to brake at the end of the runway.

The long-term strategy is global, opening dozens of Yotels in key international cities. It is already close to signing a deal in New York; London is being feverishly scouted too. A stylish, if small, room for £55 in some of the world’s most popular, not to mention expensive, destinations sounds very tempting ... on paper. But will these cool coops prove hideously claustrophobic in practice?

First impressions were favourable. So many airport hotels are actually a 20-minute drive away and deep in chintzville, but designer-dinky Yotel really is on the concourse, tucked into a corner of the South terminal arrivals hall. Check-in takes seconds at a touch-screen computer that spits out my key. I nod to the “galley” staff (Yotel-speak for the room-service team). The hotel has deliberately adopted the terminology of an aircraft as the intention is to create a business class-meets-Blade Runner ambience.

There are two types of “cabins”. The 38 seven-square-metre standard cabins are more like souped-up yacht bunks than Virgin Upper (although the same design guru, Priestman Goode, drew up both sets of blueprints). But they are classy and contemporary, with an elegant charcoal-grey leather surround for their large single beds and a flatscreen TV encased in oak veneer at their foot. An arm’s length away, through a glass partition, is the ensuite bathroom: Starck-esque stainless-steel fittings and a swanky rainforest shower. An overnight stay costs £55, room-only. Yotel says these beds can sleep two: I’d only advise that if you want to end the relationship. However, there’s also the option to book 4hr slots for £25 – and a couple could happily while away a delay in there.

The midget gems, though, are the eight Premium cabins, which cost £40 for four hours, £80 overnight. These feel genuinely luxurious. A soft white-and-grey colour scheme, coupled with lots of glass and mirrors, successfully lends the 10 square metres an impression of light and airiness. The techno wall has an oak finish, reminiscent of the dashboard of an old-fashioned Jag, and incorporates your TV, a desk and chair, an open wardrobe and shelves. There are thoughtful touches such as a decent hairdryer, eye masks and bespoke Arran Aromatics toiletries, but the pièce de résistance has to be the invitingly squidgy, cushioned-up couch that, at the touch of a button, becomes a full-length bed. When extended, there’s no more than 2ft left around it, but, with your suitcases tucked underneath, it doesn’t feel uncomfortably cramped; and there’s soothing mood lighting on the bedside control panel (which also has an MP3 docking station) to see off any claustrophobic stirrings.

As to shuteye, each bed has been custom-made and has an organic, breathable mattress and baby-soft linen. I slept reasonably well, although the lack of fresh air, natural light (Premium cabins have only a window onto the corridor, standard cabins nothing at all) and the buzz of the air con did reproduce that disorientating hermetic atmosphere of a plane a little too accurately for my liking.

When you’re awake, there are 60 TV channels, 80 radio channels, 5,000 music tracks and new-release DVDs (the last at an extra cost of £5) to keep you entertained. You can also order food through the TV. Ours was delivered within 15 minutes in nifty takeaway boxes with wooden cutlery. The menu concentrates on comfort foods, the sort granny could eat without putting her teeth in: fish cakes for £6.50, a lamb curry for £8.50, beers for £3, spirits for £3.50. In all, much more pleasant than the dehumanising experience at those busy concourse cafes. Or you can bring in your own food and ask the galley team to heat it up.

Of course, this isn’t your holiday, just a necessary evil en route to it, so, more than ever, price is a crucial factor. On Yotel’s opening night, July 1, I could book a double at the four-star Gatwick Hilton (within walking distance of the terminal but displaying all the charm of a sink estate from the 1970s) for £175, room-only – but the price does include 15 days’ free car parking. Yotel has no car park; however, a trawl of the discount sites meant I could get the whistles-and-bells, meet-and-greet valet car parking and a standard cabin for £161, and have enough left over for a celebratory bottle of wine.

Yotel also stacks up well if you’re just seeking respite from the crowds. Gatwick’s Lingfield Servisair Lounge, for example, costs £17.95pp for three hours, and although that does include free TV, magazines, alcoholic and soft drinks and snacks, there’s no complimentary internet, no privacy and it closes from 10pm until 5am. But the lounge is air side, so you can sit back and relax. Yotel is land side, which raises the dilemma of how much time to leave to clear security. Despite this drawback, if you have an early-morning flight, a lengthy scheduled layover or an unexpected delay, I’d still opt for Yotel every time. It’s definitely a hip new way to kip.

http://www.yotel.com/

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Tate Modern: Global Cities

Global Cities looks at changes in the social and built forms of ten large, dynamic, international cities: Cairo, Istanbul, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Mexico City, Mumbai, Sao Paulo, Shanghai and Tokyo. Drawing on data originally assembled for the 10th Venice Architecture Biennale, the exhibition features both visual art and architectural responses to explore these cities through five thematic lenses: speed, size, density, diversity and form. This exhibition in the Turbine Hall at Tate Modern incorporates a range of existing art works that explore conditions in each of the focus cities, with many of the international artists presenting their work in the UK for the first time. Closer to home, a number of commissions responding to the London context and to specific issues such as sustainability and social inclusion have been realised especially for the exhibition. As Global Cities takes place in the midst of one of the focus cities, the exhibition uses London as a concrete point of reference and comparison. Inspired by the local urban dimension of London as part of a global phenomenon, a selection of prestigious architectural practices have been commissioned to present research and proposals about London's urban development.

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New Blood - Print Sales Exhibition

In a bid to open up the venerable photo agency to new audiences, Magnum's New Blood exhibition showcases the work of its associates — photographers currently going through the rigorous membership process. It's an exhibition designed to show that Magnum extends beyond its well-known, provocative examples of war photojournalism; a global exploration of human life, it takes us through stunning new work, ranging from Mark Power's study of Poland and Jonas Bendiksen's haunting journey across the peripheral regions of the former Soviet Union to Alec Soth's melancholic view of the town of Niagara.

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Jarvis Cocker's Meltdown 2007

Each year MELTDOWN offers a guest director the chance to produce his or her own fantasy festival, mixing artists and art forms, reflecting their own personal passions and interests.

This year, the Artistic Director is Jarvis Cocker, who'll curate nine days of multi artform events across all the spaces and venues of Southbank Centre.

Tickets are on sale now. Click here to buy.

The festival programme is as follows:-

Crawling Kingsnakes
(featuring Bobby Gillespie, Kevin Shields and Douglas Hart) Xxteens, Forty Fives, Le Volume Courbe, The Dodoz and project Komakino

With DJs Jarvis Cocker, She Set and Danilo
Queen Elizabeth Hall, Saturday 16 June, 1.00pm-5.30pm

Motörhead + support Selfish Cunt
Royal Festival Hall, Saturday 16 June, 7.30pm
Tickets £35, £30, £25

Melanie + support Mathew Sawyer & the Ghosts
Queen Elizabeth Hall, Saturday 16 June, 7.45pm
Tickets £22.50, £20

Gonzales featuring Mocky
Purcell Room, Saturday 16 June, 7.30pm
Tickets £10

Northern Soul Night - tbc
Ballroom Floor, Saturday 16 June, post-show
non ticketed

Forest Of No Return
Hal Willner presents the Vintage Disney Songbook
Featuring Jarvis Cocker plus very special guests
Royal Festival Hall, Sunday 17 June, 7.30pm
Tickets £27.50 / £22.50

KPM Allstars
Queen Elizabeth Hall, Sunday 17 June, 7.45pm
Tickets £18.50, £16

Roky Erickson + support Clinic
Royal Festival Hall, Monday 18 June, 7.30pm
Tickets £25, £20

SUNN O))) + support Chrome Hoof
Queen Elizabeth Hall, Monday 18 June, 7.45pm
Tickets £15, £12.50

Saint Etienne presents Turntable Cafe
Ballroom Floor, Monday 18 June, post show
non ticketed

Devo + support DRUMIZE (SCOTCH EGG BAND)
Royal Festival Hall, Tuesday 19 June, 7.30pm
Tickets £45, £30

Forced Entertainment: Bloody Mess
Queen Elizabeth Hall, Tuesday 19 June, 7.45pm
Tickets £17.50, £15

Matthew Glamorre
Ballroom Floor, Tuesday 19 June, post show
non ticketed

Iggy & the Stooges + support Scout Niblett
Royal Festival Hall, Wednesday 20 June, 7.30pm
Tickets £32.50, £30

Jerry Dammers’ Spatial AKA Orchestra
Queen Elizabeth Hall, Wednesday 20 June, 7.45pm
Tickets TBC

Jarvis in conversation with Don Letts
Purcell Room, Wednesday 20 June, 6.30pm
Tickets £5

Don Letts DJ Set
Ballroom Floor, Wednesday 20 June, post show
non ticketed

John Barry & The London Philharmonic Orchestra
The cinematic works of John Barry chosen by Jarvis Cocker
Royal Festival Hall, Thursday 21 June, 7.30pm
Tickets £55, £45, £35, £25

Cornershop / Jeffery Lewis & The Meteorites
Queen Elizabeth Hall, Thursday 21 June, 7.45pm
Tickets £15

The Jesus & Mary Chain + support 1990s
Royal Festival Hall, Friday 22 June, 7.30pm
Tickets £27.50, £22.50

Optimo DJ’s - the Glasgow based club to host /DJ
Ballroom Floor, Friday 22 June, post show
non ticketed

Jarvis Cocker + support The Valerie Project
Royal Festival Hall, Saturday 23 June, 7.30pm
Tickets £27.50, £22.50

Lost Ladies of Folk
Featuring Bonnie Dobson, Wendy Flower and Susan Christie
Queen Elizabeth Hall, Saturday 23 June, 7.45pm
Tickets £17.50, £15

Desperate Sound System and more to be announced
Ballroom Floor, Saturday 23 June, post show
non ticketed

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Damien Hirst: Beyond Belief @ White Cubeh

Damien Hirst: Beyond Belief

3 Jun –7 Jul 2007

This exhibition will open at both White Cube, Mason's Yard and White Cube, Hoxton Square on 3 June 2007.

Viewing 'For the Love of God' at White Cube Mason's Yard is restricted to ticket entry only. The majority of tickets are available from White Cube Mason's Yard on the day.

In conjunction with Damien Hirst’s exhibition ‘Beyond Belief’, White Cube is pleased to announce the release of eight new limited edition works.

These works include a series of silkscreens depicting Hirst’s extraordinary diamond skull ‘For the Love of God’, a life-size cast of a human skull in platinum, covered entirely by 8,601 VVS to flawless pavé-set diamonds. In addition to these silkscreens there are three works on canvas, each with paracetamol pills and syringes. These relate closely to the new series of ‘Fact’ and ‘Biopsy’ paintings which focus upon issues surrounding Western medicine, and continue Hirst’s long standing interest in the themes of life and death.

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Fly Apart @ Vegas Gallery

96 gillespie presents philadelphia arts

96 Gillespie, one of London's premier contemporary arts spots, is hidden beneath the relic that is the old Arsenal Stadium. A small but significant gallery showcasing the finest in American art, 96 currently plays host to Blood In, Blood Out, a mixed-media installation by Philadelphia arts collective Space 1026. In their first UK show, 1026 don't compromise their trademark collaborative group spirit, occupying the gallery with their characteristically vivid aesthetic in an energetic and chaotic exploration of the ego, consumerism and crime.

From the web site:

96 gillespie presents philadelphia arts collective, space 1026, in their first UK showing

space 1026
blood in, blood out
a 25 + member group known for their fun and collaborative spirit, their installations embody the diverse personalities and disciplines within the group as well as coalesce them into a tight, over the top aesthetic that combines print-making, drawing, sculpture, design, and video in an infectious visual chaos.

for this exhibition, the group will be exploring the concepts of individualism and identity through art and fashion. running themes include crime and consumerism.

opens thursday . jun 7 . 2007 . 7-9 pm

show runs jun 8 - jul 1 . 2007
gallery hours tu - su . 2 - 6 pm

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Panic Attack! Art in the Punk Years @ Barbican

5 June 2007 - 9 September 2007
Barbican Art Gallery

Part of Panic Attack! Cinema in the Punk Years 1974 -84

June 2007 marks two remarkable 30 year anniversaries: the Queen’s Silver Jubilee and the release of the Sex Pistols’ irreverent God Save the Queen with its infamous album* cover by Jamie Reid. To coincide with these landmark events, Barbican Art Gallery is staging Panic Attack! Art in the Punk Years.

The exhibition explores art produced from the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s in Britain and the United States, at a time when both countries were a breeding ground for subcultures of punk and post-punk. Although the punk movement is largely known for its music, fashion and graphics, this exhibition exposes the vibrant art scene that emerged during these years, most notably in London, New York and Los Angeles.

Including the work of some 30 artists, the exhibition examines art which shares many of the concerns and attitudes associated with the punk years. Many of the artists have direct links with the punk scene including Nan Goldin, Derek Jarman and Raymond Pettibon, others have less well-known, but significant connections with punk in their early careers, such as Tony Cragg, Jenny Holzer and Barbara Kruger.

The inner city as a place of fantasy, protest and decay, the body as a political battleground and the dynamic cross-over between the worlds of art and music are major themes of the exhibition.
David Wojnarowicz in New York and Stephen Willats in London turned to urban dereliction as a symbol of personal and social crisis, as did New York artists such as Jean-Michel Basquiat who were closely associated with the emergence of graffiti art.

Panic Attack! also explores the inter-disciplinary nature of the punk movement and the many collaborations that formed between artists and musicians during this period. Robert Mapplethorpe was a contemporary of the first generation of punk stars in New York, notably Patti Smith. At the same time, London-based artist and filmmaker Derek Jarman was making his super-8 film of the iconic Jordan in full punk make-up, dressed as a ballerina.

By the end of the punk movement in the mid-1980s, London’s vibrant club scene had become a source of inspiration. Cerith Wyn Evans was one of many artists who documented this underground hedonism in a film which included footage of Leigh Bowery, the London clubbing luminary celebrated for his outrageous costumes and body modifications.

This fascinating exhibition examines artists who represented, in very different and often unexpected ways, the punk zeitgeist of the 1970s and 1980s. Their work was sometimes confrontational or angry, but always fiercely independent and intelligent, reflecting the anarchic spirit of the punk years.

PUBLICATION
A book accompanies the exhibition, published by Merrell priced £29.95.

Panic Attack! is curated by Mark Sladen, Director of Exhibitions, ICA and Ariella Yedgar, Curator, Barbican Art Gallery.

[*God Save The Queen is a single. Never Mind The Bullock's...Here's The Sex Pistols is the name of the album, ed.]

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