Brooks Mews at the back of Claridge’s hotel is a nightmare of construction vehicles, blocking each other, turning and compromising access to poor pedestrians like me. I hope the businesses there, including the two art galleries, have sought and obtained business rates relief.
Beyond this chaos, there is something strange – a huge golden apple sitting on the pavement on a dull wet February day, in front of a window with sheep leading into Ben Brown Fine Arts.
Not far away, in Bond Street, a modern interpretation of Lord Duveen’s studio rooms at Levy Gorvy has shown that white-white walled pristine gallery can be twisted to something more rich and personal; here Les Lalanne is a quirky, a mad, twisting, swirling dinner party, with the Mad Hatter replaced with all sorts of different animals, sitting on writhing, naturalisic furniture at a table with over-sized cups and saucers and coffee pot.
Les Lalanne is a celebration, curated by Manfredi della Gherardesca, of the work of French artists Claude and Francois-Xavier Lalanne (both born in the 1920′s) who came to fame with the auction of Yves Saint Laurent’s collection in 2009 and an overdue exhibition in Paris in 2010.