Play with the city - London

With east London being notorious for having some of the UK’s best street art, Nissan QASHQAI and Tate Modern have teamed up together to give you an exclusive free tour of the area.

Running on various weekends throughout July and August, Tate Modern and Nissan QASHQAI are giving you the chance to take part in a series of driving and cycling tours throughout the various streets housing these exclusive pieces.

To take part in Driving Tours, simply register using the form below and let us do the rest. Confirmation details will be sent to you once we have processed your application. For the cycling tours, simply turn up on the day and register at the Nissan Information Tunnel.

DRIVING TOUR DETAILS

Visitors can turn up at any time between 10AM and 4.30PM and should meet at the Nissan Information Tunnel outside Tate Modern. Pick up and drop off will be from Tate Modern and the tours will take approximately two hours; the walking tour takes one hour and the drive to and from Tate Modern takes half an hour each way.

The Starr Auditorium on Friday evening at Tate Modern was jam packed with an audience keen to hear The Wooster Collective talk about Street art, ‘A World View’.

Discussing street art from around the globe, The Wooster Collective used Banksy, Space Invader, Roadsworth and Mark Jenkins as excellent examples. Favorites had the crowd laughing included a piece by Josua Allen Harris and rather a strange collection of an urban problem facing us all, The Spinkle Brigade.

The talk revolved around the basics of street art; having a point of view, dedication, personal and intimate and surprise and delight. The talk concluded with two main points; Street Art is only successful when it has a dialogue, even if only with one person and its need by all to unify ‘ugly’ spaces before the ‘gentification’ of urban areas.

A fascinating talk which is to be followed Friday 25th July at 6.30-7.30 by a talk from Street Artist Pure Evil and art critic JJ Charlesworth on ‘Collecting Street Art’. Not to be missed!

An energetic audience greeted the artists Brad Downey and Mustafa Hulusi first of several Street Art talks sponsored by Nissan QASHQAI at Tate Modern.

Discussing the history of fly posting in London during the 1980’s, Mustafa gave a humorous and personal insight into a decade when regions of London where controlled by fly poster ‘gangs’. An artist in his own right, Mustafa recalled his early days as a student and his first fly poster evenings though to the fall of the fly poster activity due to a change in society and the gentrification of urban streets.

Brad Downey showcased several ‘inspiring’ street art films, including ‘Spontaneous Sculpture’, shot on 35mm by a friend over a four hour period, ‘On/Off’ showing how he managed to ‘urban-hack’ thirty Parisian shop fronts, and a work in progress which showed Brad setting fire to a CCTV camera.

The audience presented a series of challenging questions to the panel, including why one of the presenters was actually at the talk to why Brad Downey doesn’t make it his agenda to set fire to every CCTV in London, Brad responded with ‘Why don’t you? Why does it have to be me to do that?’

If the rest of the Street Art talks are anything like this then we are in for a massive treat. Make some time for these talks, roll on Friday 18th July when Tate Modern present ‘A World View’ at 18.30-19.30.