Stephen Friedman Gallery

This is a great commercial gallery on Old Burlington Street and is well worth a visit right now to see the show by the American artist Jennifer Rubell: «Engagement».
We dropped by on Saturday afternoon and apart from the lovely staff we had the place to ourselves. This struck me as being quite strange given that we had passed hordes of people at the bottom of the street queuing to get into the Abercrombie and Fitch store; strange times we live in.
There are two exhibition spaces in this modern building situated in the heart of Mayfair with an open plan office space in between. The gallery is home to a range of contemporary artists and there is usually something of interest on show.
The Rubell show left me quite giddy and I would recommend that you try to drop by before it ends on 5 March. In the front room you have a life sized wax model of Prince William mounted off centre on a plinth. The idea is that you step on up, put your arm through his, and slip your finger into the engagement ring pinned onto his suit jacket. Just brilliant: lots of fun and a weird riff on the whole royalty, Prince Charming thing.
In the back room it gets even better with the «drinking paintings» which took some inspiration from the official engagement picture of William and Kate (I think the size of the canvas matches that of the picture behind them in the photograph). Each raw canvas has a brass spigot protruding from it and to one side there is a plastic cup dispenser and the idea is that you pour yourself a drink. This action gradually «paints» the canvas with a series of splashes and drips. This Saturday I enjoyed a good sized nip of Sloe Gin, Irish Whiskey and a fine Rum.
This is my kind of modern art and I will be popping back next week.

I really struggled to decide whether to give this gallery 2 or 3 stars. I was really looking forward to going to the Stephen Friedman Gallery because I had hears so much about it. I have decided not to let my disappointed high expectations sway my vote and have decided to go with 3 stars instead of 2. There are two sections to the gallery one open to the public one across the street by appointment only. But you don’t really need to go in because it is set up to be viewed from outside and is a unique window display. The gallery does display insightful and challenging work, and exhibits at Freeze Art Fair. I just didn’t manage to go one a day that coincided with the reputation of the gallery.

The Stephen Friedman gallery is a brilliant contemporary art gallery in London’s upmarket Mayfair area. The artists it represents are extremely high quality, internationally recognized fine artists and the shows put on here showcasing each artist are extremely interesting. The space is very light and spacious and pleasant to visit.