With record numbers visiting this weekend in Battersea and with its second residence opening in Hampstead this Wednesday, the Affordable Art Fair 2011 is London’s art exhibition of the moment.

We are very excited to see so many of our Art Store galleries exhibiting this year, including TAG Fine Arts, Cornwall Contemporary, Beside the Wave and DegreeArt, all of who offer Own Art Online exclusively through CultureLabel. The Own Art scheme is run by The Arts Council and makes buying art even more affordable offering the option to spread payments over 10 months interest-free (0% APR Representative).

If you’re not able to make it down to the fair this year, CultureLabel has curated a selection of our favourite pieces from the show and many more works from our Art Store under £600. Check out – It has to be this way 1 by Lindsay Seers , Up and Over by Diane Taylor and Fly Free by Rachel Cloyne.

You can view all the works in our Affordable Art section now live on CultureLabel here. With prices starting from just £40, now is the time to start your art collection and live with the art you love!

Introducing latest partner graphic designer Nick Patchitt and his new series of city prints capturing all the brilliant things that make up London, Brighton and New York.

We asked Nick to tell us more about his vibrant & graphic city montages:

Who and what inspires you?
Anything graphic and eye-catching – whether it be a logo, symbol, pictogram or lettering. I am naturally drawn towards anything that can be distilled into a simple graphic shape or silhouette. Saul Bass, famous for his film posters, is probably the one person who’s work I find particularly inspiring.

Your city prints are made up of hundreds of illustrations, how much time do you spend drawing before you have enough material for a work?
The whole process is very time consuming and challenging. I probably research visual reference for a city for 3-4 weeks and then spend another 4-6 weeks redrawing buildings and symbols in Adobe Illustrator or sourcing ready made font dingbats and Royalty Free vector files. Redrawing buildings is especially tortuous! Then piecing the bits together is another 3 weeks at least.

Are your city prints inspired from personal visits?
The city prints done so far are obvious choices. I’ve worked in graphic design and branding in London for 20 years, lived in Brighton for the past 10 years and visited New York many times. They each have a unique feel about them are very visual and have a distinct personality.

It just came to me one day to try when I was looking at some watercolours of Brighton Pier to try and do something very different and use my graphic eye to portray a city, its energy and vibrancy in graphic form.

Nickprints are £52.50 and you can find the full collection on CultureLabel here.

To celebrate Turner Prize winner Grayson Perry’s exhibition ‘Tomb of Unknown Craftsman’ currently on at the British Museum, we are offering an exclusive 10% discount on his collection on CultureLabel…

Grayson Perry approached the British Museum with the idea of exhibiting his work alongside that of the craftwork of unknown artists held by the museum, ranging from figures of the ancient Egyptian god Amon-Ra to badges from the 1980s.

Grayson’s work uses the seductive qualities of ceramics, tapestry, metalwork and other art forms to make stealthy comments about societal injustices and hypocrisies, and to explore a variety of historical and contemporary themes. In the process he has sealed his place in the long legacy of craftsmanship and re-asserted the importance of the crafts in a contemporary world of mass production.

One of our favourites from the collection is his beautiful British Museum Map Silk Scarf, of which Grayson says:
“When working with the British Museum for my exhibition, I became very aware of the huge scope and scale of the institution. This map scarf is perhaps a very personal guide to the spirit of the place. I have characterised the museum here as a slightly tyrannical monster not unlike my dear old Teddy Bear, Alan Measles. I think of the BM as a friendly giant. He can get grouchy and cynical at times as he is constantly being besieged by visitors wielding cameras but above all it is a place of wonder and beauty and learning.”

The collection also includes tees, mugs and tote bags featuring the drawing by Grayson of The Kenilworth AM1, a motorbike on which he travelled during a ten day pilgrimage across Bavaria and is on display at the exhibition.

See Grayson Perry’s exhibition at the British Museum from the 6^th of October 2011 to the 19^th of February 2012 and check out his collection from the comfort of your own home on CultureLabel here.

Jammy Dodgers – better than the Bourbon and Custard Cream? The jury has always been out at CultureLabel until ceramicist Rebecca Wilson sent us her latest work ‘Light Snack’ which elevates one of the nation’s family favourites to new artistic heights and into this sumptuous chandelier.

Rebecca’s dazzling ‘Light Snack’ made its debut at Collect this year, the flagship event from the Crafts Council held at The Saatchi Gallery and features over 1500 replica biscuits made of milk white translucent bone china and vivid pink jammy resin.

Here she tells us more about baking ceramic biscuits and glamourising the most basic of human pleasures:

Tell us more about ‘Light Snack’…
In this age of austerity we must look to the humble things that make us happy, and we must celebrate them with reckless abandon. The Light Snack series, which aims to glamorise the little pleasures in life, has been on my mind for a good while now.

Can you tell us more about the process of making ‘Light Snack’?
Repetition, repetition, repetition! That just about sums it up. The first stage in the process was to create moulds for the three different sizes of biscuit (they diminish in size as they reach the top and bottom of the chandelier). It took around 10 weeks to cast, cut out centres, drill holes and fettle 1500 jammy dodgers (plus spares). I then added the jam to each biscuit after firing and am proud to say that every single one was made individually, by my own hands.

What and who inspires your work?
My work is a collage of imagery and objects, and the recurring theme that brings the disparate areas of inspiration together is temptation – be it a naughty 50’s pinup, a flouncy shiny porcelain figurine, or a big fruity, creamy tart! I love the work of 50’s calendar artist George Petty, whose voluptuous and curvy ladies really look like they would have given into the temptation of the odd custard slice.

What are your plans for the future?
My current project is another ambitious light piece. I am creating a fibre optic chandelier for an exhibition entitled ‘Reflection’ at the City Art Centre in Edinburgh in November. In this piece cups of tea will hang from a single fibre optic strand and will have a light source within it, creating a ghostly glow. The concept for this piece entitled ‘One Hundred Cups of Tea, Never to Be’ is that the ghostly little cups are the unrealised potential of the broken teapot.

I’ll also be at Lustre in the Lakeside Arts Centre in Nottingham from 4^th – 6^th November showcasing my domestic and jewellery ranges there, including tableware and lighting.

View Rebecca Wilson’s full collection and read more about her work on CultureLabel here.