Rude Britannia

An inspiring morning at Tate Britain, mainly to see Rude Britannia, an exhibition surveying British comic art. Everyone from Hogarth, Gilray and Cruikshank to Glenn Baxter, Steve Bell and Viz . Oh and saucy seaside postcards. A curatorial stroke of genius was to invite Viz to present room 2 after a rather academic opening. Brought things down to a wonderfully base level.

Then explored Mike Nelson's The Coral Reef next door. I walked straght past it at first before spotted the 'entrance': an unassuming, shabby door which looked like it would open into a storeroom, which turned out to be not too far from the truth. The 'installation' is a labyrinthe of around 50 interconnected small, claustrophobic and rather creepy rooms with not a lot in them. Sort of a cross between what you might find in the bowels of the Home Office and a Stasi interrogation room. The British Council has chosen Nelson to represent UK at next year's Venice Biennale which should be interesting.

Then a very pleasant pub lunch with Andrew H at the White Swan round the corner, where Andrew C and I would plan for creative happenings 20 years ago including covering St Paul's Cathedral with bread & butter.