Dom Haley might not know art, but he knows what he likes...
Value: 10
Queues: 8
Shop: 8
Family Friendly: 5
Enjoyment: 9
Total: 40/50
If there's one place everyone in London should visit at some point in their lives, then it’s Tate Modern. We're lucky to have this one on our doorstep. I've been to modern art museums in Berlin, Paris and Barcelona ,and while they all have their particular charms and oddities, arguably none can match the sheer scale of this former power station. It’s also the best place to creep on the art-college girls on a Sunday.
However, before you grab your keys and head out the door, a word of warning: almost everything in Tate Modern is pretty high concept, and this is definitely not the place to visit if your idea of art is nice pictures of fruit bowls or ships going at each other on the high seas. It’s also not really the best place to be hungover. Some of the exhibitions either require a lot of brain-power or just freak you out. My recent visit, for example, was on the back of two hours' sleep, and I found myself feeling queasy whilst staring at a Rothko and weirdly sick when watching a video of a swan raping a woman.
For most visitors, the main attraction has to be the Unilever commission in the massive Turbine Hall. One of the most awe-inspiring art spaces in the world, this cathedral-sized room has seen some sights in its eleven year history, from Carsten Holler turning it into the funnest adventure playground ever to Dorris Salcedo getting Britain’s art community to ‘fess up to its imperial past via the medium of a massive crack in the floor.
Right now it'sAi Weiwei’s Sunflower Seeds, a starkly beautiful installation that consists of thousands upon thousands of hand-crafted porcelain sunflower seeds strewn down one side of the floor. Both a celebration of Chinese craftsmanship and a subtle criticism of China’s growing industrial might, where the ‘Worker’s Paradise’ has become a vast dehumanising workshop, it definitely makes you think. We found out the following Monday that the artist was arrested in Hong Kong by Chinese authorities, and even now no one has been able contact him.
After the Turbine Hall, the third floor is the first place most people visit, and for some unknown reason, the two galleries on this floor are arguably the most hardcore. For example, the first one that greets you when you get off the escalator is dedicated to the abstract, expressionist and abstract expressionist movements of the early to mid-20th century, where you can battle through works by Monet, Matisse and Rothko, whilst on the fifth floor the main gallery is dedicated to Soviet realism, pop art and hyper-realism. Now, I know I’m a moron when it comes to art appreciation, but surely most casual art-lovers would find the fifth floor easier to handle than being pitched straight into highbrow conceptual art. I never even knew there was a fifth floor until recently, as I’m always so done in by the third floor, I have to get a coffee and a sit down. Then again, what do I know?
Criticisms aside, there’s some real delights in all of the galleries. Way too many to list here mind, but whilst you're trawling around trying to find the works by Dali and Picasso, make sure you make time to find the Chapman Brothers' weird stuff, a strange glowing kitchen set by Mona Hatoum and Jenny Holzer’s Blue Purple Tilt, an LED installation spouting existential messages that gave me a serious sensory overload.
In fact, sensory overload seems to be the name of the game when it comes to Tate Modern. Exiting through the gift shop (which depressingly is the busiest room today) my brain is so fried that I walk over Millennium Bridge like a zombie. Like the British Museum and the V&A, Tate Modern is way too big to fathom in just one visit, but if you stick with it, you’ll find that it really is the gift that keeps on giving.
Click here for London tourist events
Click here to see all London exhibitions.
Click here for things to do in London.
Return to Spoonfed's London Art homepage.
Add an event
Scoping Out London’s Coolest Historic Bingo Halls
London’s bingo halls were once a bustling part of many of the city’s communities, but as...