DIY Art Market

www.diyartmarket.com
Twitter: @diyartmarket
Instagram: diyartmarket
Occasional events at locations in Hackney and Peckham

If you want proof that London is a city packed with young creative people, you could do a lot worse than attend one of these DIY Art Markets where a vast number of painters, cartoonists, fanzine publishers, print makers, jewellers and textile artists congregate to display and sell their wares.

At any of these events your bound to encounter work that is original, sometimes beautiful, but very often thought provoking and downright funny.  The events are full of the kind of youthful enthusiasm that is great to experience.  I loved the ceramic plates with erotic depictions in a kind of primitive style and the radical fanzines with all kinds of off field political ideas and images.  One stall represented an Eastern European art collective with a really unusual collection of print designs that seemed a modern take on the old soviet style posters.  There are so many great things here if you like contemporary art and design that you are bound to find something to take away and treasure.  I am still chuckling at the handful of funny cloth badges I bought from a young artists calling herself J W Badges and the A2 photographic poster I bought is still looking for a frame but will no doubt find its place on our office wall.  

These markets are really great places to visit just for the fun of it and a lot of the artists here seem to be here as much for the fun of it as to do business.  One t-shirt on display by artist Babak Ganjei declared ‘ART IS THE THING NOBODY ASKED YOU TO DO’ and that seems to embody the spirit of the event and although nobody asked, I’m glad this group of over 80 creatives are doing their thing.

The atmosphere of the market is helped by great background music which is played just loud enough to notice without being intrusive and their is the added appeal of a great in-house café serving good coffee and snacks.

This feature is taken from our forthcoming book:
London's Markets
by Andrew Kershman