20 things to look forward to for the rest of the year Pt 1
Art and restaurants
At the end of last year we published our regular ‘Things to Look Forward to’ issues, looking at the ten exhibitions, ten shows and ten restaurant openings that we were most excited about for 2023:
Most of the things we covered in those two issues have now already happened so, as we’re taking our summer break next week, we thought we’d spend the next two issues looking at what the second half of 2023 has to offer us, culturally speaking. Today it’s exhibitions and restaurants; then, in Wednesday’s subscriber issue, we’ll take a look at theatre and ‘other stuff’ (be warned, the word ‘immersive’ might crop up once or twice).
As with all our Monday editions, this issue is public, so if you enjoy it please feel free to share it on whichever platform you feel most comfortable with:
5 exhibitions to look forward to
Now that Beyonce has left London, the V&A is stepping in to try and fill the Bey-shaped hole with its Diva exhibition, opening at the end of this month. Designed to “celebrate the power and creativity of iconic performers,” as well as how the idea of the diva has “been subverted or embraced over time across opera, stage, popular music, and film,” the exhibition will feature everyone from Maria Callas and Billie Holiday to Lizzo, Whitney and (of course) Tina Turner. There’s a Q&A with fashion designer Bob Mackie to mark the opening of the exhibition, tickets for which have already sold out, but they are live streaming the event via Zoom.
(Also, in September, the V&A are following up Diva with Gabrielle Chanel: Fashion Manifesto, the first UK exhibition dedicated to the work of the legendary ‘Coco’.)
The big event happening at the Imperial War Museum this year is the opening of the Blavatnik Art, Film and Photography Galleries in “late 2023” (let’s try and forget for second that the new galleries bear the name of a Trump-supporting Russian oligarch). But before that happens, the museum is exploring “the role of deception in conflict” with its Spies, Lies and Deception exhibition. Starting in September, the exhibition “will look at the tricks, lures and espionage that make up the secret world of deception” and introduce audiences to some of the most “audacious deceptions of the last hundred years”.
One of our favourite exhibitions of the year so far was Mike Nelson: Extinction Beckons at the Hayward Gallery. In October, Japanese photographer, Hiroshi Sugimoto has the job of following that up as the Hayward hosts Time Machine, a major retrospective of his work. Sugimoto has been creating stuff for 50 years so there’s plenty to choose from, including his studies of electricity, his large scale pictures of seascapes and theatres “and his more recent forays into architecture, sculpture and set design”. (Fun fact: Sugimoto is the proud owner of a huge collection of prosthetic human eyes). Hiroshi Sugimoto: Time Machine opens in October and runs until January 2024.
The Whitechapel Gallery’s recent exhibition Action, Gesture, Paint: Women in Global Abstraction, 1940-1970 got pretty decent reviews when it opened earlier this year. In November it will be the turn of Tate Britain to stage its version of an all-women exhibition, with Women in revolt! (Art, Activism and the Women’s movement in the UK 1970–1990). Tate Britain has, of course, recently been dragged over the coals somewhat for daring to rehang its collection in an way that addresses particular social issues, including the role of women in art. Hopefully this show, which will feature over 100 women artists who “were largely left out of the artistic narratives of the time,” will go some way to reviving their reputation with the critics.
(Also, starting in September, the Tate has an exhibition entirely dedicated to a woman who definitely helped shape the artistic narratives of her time: Sarah Lucas).
Finally, if you’re not completely Hockneyed out for the year, then the newly-reopened National Portrait Gallery is putting on David Hockney: Drawing from Life from November. Unlike the oversized and immersive Bigger & Closer (not smaller & further away) that’s currently on in King’s Cross, this show will explore Hockney as draughtsman “focusing on depictions of himself and a small group of sitters close to him: his muse, Celia Birtwell; his mother, Laura Hockney; and friends, the curator, Gregory Evans, and master printer, Maurice Payne.”
5 restaurants to look forward to
Despite it being over a year since Danny Trejo raised a bunch of money to open one of his restaurants in central London, we haven’t heard any more news of when Trejo’s Tacos will open. But, thankfully there are plenty of other places opening their doors before the end of 2023.
(N.B. Just like last year we’ve set ourselves the challenge of picking five upcoming restaurants that aren’t in east London. No Dalston, no Hackney, no Shoreditch, and no sharing plates and natural wines. We’ve also discounted anywhere coming to Battersea Power Station and OWO.)
We have to start by mentioning Manzi’s, just because it’s been on the cards for so long that we included it in our Things to Look Forward to in 2022 issue. Back then it was still under the ownership of Jeremy King and Chris Corbin, but obviously a lot has happened in Wolseley land since then (see this issue for more on that), so some of the romance has been rubbed off this revival of the “legendary fish restaurant” that used to be on Leicester Square. But it sounds like the new owners haven’t cut any corners, installing plenty of “mermaids and mermen, whimsically nautical adornments and abundance of sea creatures” in their new Soho Square location. On the menu are all the classics, including lobster roll, prawn cocktail and giant plates of ‘fruits de mer’ to share.
We’re going south now, to North Cross Road in East Dulwich, where Souvlaki Street are opening their first bricks and mortar restaurant after ten years of serving excellent stuffed Greek pittas from market stalls around Brixton and West Norwood (as well as the inevitable lockdown DIY kits). The menu isn’t changing much, but that’s okay, because the when it’s full of free-range pork and locally sourced chicken, grilled to perfection and served with locally produced halloumi and their fantastic chips and sauces, then why change things?
Over in Islington, everyone has been keeping an eye on the old Manze pie and mash shop on Chapel Market for months now. There’s been no pie and mash sold there since 2020, but Alex Pashby of streetfood company The Beefsteaks took ownership of the place at what was the worst possible time (just before the first lockdown) and has spent the last three years fighting the pandemic, squatters and English Heritage (to get listed status for the place) and is finally due to reopen the place as a Brat-esque steakhouse any day now. It was due in May, but as of this past weekend they were posting on Instagram that the restaurant isn’t open yet and you can still only get their grub at Maltby Street Market.
We have to include one insanely high end place that we could only go to if someone else was picking up the bill, and for 2023 that restaurant is undoubtedly Aragawa. The Kobe beef specialists have been doing incredible things with fatty cow meat in Tokyo since the 60s and they’ve been threatening to open their first restaurant outside of Japan in Mayfair for over a year now. As of yet, there’s no sign of their minimalist and very expensive menu being available to Londoners, but it could happen any day now. So, if your boss is looking for ideas for where to take the team for the Christmas meal this year…
Finally we’re going back to Soho for a new restaurant from a French group that’s determined to conquer London with its Italian dishes and glamour. No, we’re not talking about Big Mamma, this is Daroco who currently have two ridiculously hip outposts in Paris (one in Jean-Paul Gaultier’s former sewing workshop) with suitably opulent decor to accompany their versions of classic Italian dishes like squid ink spaghetti with mussels and pappardelle with beef ragu. Their first London location (there’s bound to be more on the way) is due to open in the somewhat vast and impersonal Ilona Rose House (where Foyle’s Bookshop used to be) in September, but hopefully they’ll be able to overcome the slightly soulless surroundings with the power of tiramisu and Limoncello.
Coming up on Wednesday…
The second part of our ‘things to look forward to’ list contains Sarah Jessica Parker, Andrew ‘Hot Priest’ Scott, Muhammad Ali and an awful lot of Guinness.
Our midweek issues only go out to subscribers, so if you’re not already a supporter of LiB, then you know what to do:
5 little bits
It was easy to miss amongst the maelstrom of outrage surrounding the Johnson honours list last week, but Shaun Bailey is now a Lord. Yes, the Shaun Bailey who failed spectacularly as a mayoral candidate in 2021 and then posed for a photograph at a ‘gathering’ (party) that “was alleged to have broken Covid restrictions”. When this peerage was rumoured to be happening towards the end of last year, Sadiq Khan said it would represent “a slap in the face” for bereaved Covid families. That hasn’t stopped Bailey continuing to take home over £60k a year for his position as a member of the London Assembly.
Hot on the heels of Harrow council trying to ban feeding the ducks, Greenwich Council has published a list of over 30 streets “where ice cream vans could be prohibited from trading”.
After New York turned orange with Canadian wildfire smoke last week, Adam Gopnik wrote a column for the New Yorker headlined What We Can Learn from London’s Smoke-Filled Skies. The column claims that despite the fact “we all have nostalgic longing for the London fog as a blanket of mystery in the Sherlock Holmes stories” (!), we should remember that it also killed “thousands of people”. Glad to be of service, America.
The National Portrait Gallery is pretty busy right now. But it’s had to pause preparations for its much-anticipated reopening to answer rumours that Kate Middleton used her position as a NPG patron to force the removal of a painting that depicts Prince William and Prince Harry not hating each other. For its part, the Gallery has said that the painting by Nick Philipps hasn’t been on display since August 2018 and they are “only able to display a small percentage within our building.”
Two bullshit pieces on London popped up over the weekend. One, from travel site Travelbag, which has “analysed the data behind Instagram and TikTok hashtags for over 100 cities” to figure out that London “is officially 2023’s prettiest place to visit this summer”. Someone tell Travelbag that cities are not meant to be ‘pretty’ and if they want pretty they should go somewhere like the Lake District. Meanwhile, the Mail has taken Westminster council’s threat to close down Trisha’s as “the final death knell for the area's once unique nightlife”. Hilariously, they blame this development “on so-called yuppies” who “are accused of moving into the area - known for its nightlife - before complaining to the council about noise and late-night openings.” There’s a point buried in there somewhere, but seriously… Yuppies?