Sometime ago I organised my first Hype community art hunt in London with a group of ten lovely Influencers, where we all met up in Shoreditch and split into teams, then spent the afternoon hunting for cool art and things to share with you guys on Hype!

We made it more interesting by giving each team a special #hypehunt envelope with a list of things to find, some specific and some not, with an assigned points value for each, and then asked everybody to share them on the app — maybe you saw some of them?

 

We chose Shoreditch as it has to be one of the most lively places in London for art, not to mention its international significance for street-art. We were particularly curious what our Influencers would make of it, with so many walls, lampposts and rooftops adorned with works by artists such as Banksy, Eine, D*Face, ROA, WRDSMTH, Otto Schade and more — many of whom also have their work on display in some of the world’s most esteemed galleries.

 

We started the hunt at the Stolen Space art gallery, where they have an amazing collection of Underground Art — their artists tend to have a background in graffiti and street-art, but not exclusively. On this occasion they had a great exhibition by two of the UK’s most exciting graffiti artists, Gary Stranger and Pref, Gary x Pref — in this show the two explored duality within the English language, playing with idioms and words to create intense and thought-provoking pieces.

 

 

 

After Stolen Space we split up, and with our special Hype maps in hand, they all took to the streets to look for exciting pieces of street-art and to get to know each other a little better. Along the way they stopped at Proof Gallery, where they checked out Lucas Dupuy’s first solo show, Compilations 09–16, which used both digital and analogue processes to produce a series of print-based paintings.

 

 

Next stop was the Calvert 22 gallery, a not-for-profit organisation committed to sharing the contemporary culture and creativity of the New East (eastern Europe, the Balkans, Russia, and Central Asia). Our Influencers were just in time to see the final part of their Power and Architecture season, focused on the different areas of architecture’s relationship to power, from current reflections on socialist cities, to life in unrealised utopian societies that were never finished.

 

 

At the Hales Gallery, which is twinned with a second location in New York, they found Stuart Brisley’s intriguing Georgiana Collection — a collection of sculptural works that originated in 1979–83 when Brisley was working on Georgiana Street, the site of a hostel for the homeless, which he then continued later from 1988–91 and again recently. Brisley is known for producing work that questions social and political structures through different kinds of artistic mediums.

 

One of the more vibrant stops along the way was at the Howard Griffin Gallery, where they have a wonderful full-scale and immersive installation of works by Thierry Noir, The Thierry Noir Museum — this graphic artist uses a simple style to represent his subjects, as well as a wonderful sense of colour, to create iconic characters. This one was a big hit amongst our Influencers, so make sure you head along there before December 31st to check it out!

 

 

To finish off the day, we all met up at the Shoreditch Platform — London’s first pay-by-the-hour co-working space and cocktail lounge for creative business and individuals. This place only officially launched on October 20th and is a breath of fresh air on London’s co-working scene — covered in illustrations by Ivo Bisignano and sponsored by Moët & Chandon, here you’ll find everything you need to successfully work hard and play hard.

 

We had the whole place to ourselves and caught up over a few drinks on what our Influnecers had discovered throughout the day. It was so enjoyable to hear all of the different interpretations of what they had seen — especially as everybody had a different experience and relationship with Shoreditch’s history and artistic culture prior to the event.