I don’t know about you, but these recessionary times are getting me down.  No longer am I able to haemorrhage my disposable income around Greater London with reckless glee, and my fledgling collection of contemporary art, I thought, would have to take a reluctant back-seat whilst I filled my trolley with value tinned tomatoes and reduced meat products.

Luckily I need not have worried (or bought such a large quantity of braising steak) as last Sunday was the Vauxhall Art Car Boot Fair!  Now in its fifth year, and held at Brick Lane’s famed Truman Brewery, the Art Car Boot Fair features an impressive line of artists and designers selling their wares (Sir Peter Blake, Gavin Turk, William Tempest, Bob and Roberta Smith… the list goes on and on).  Vauxhall, who have supported the Fair since 2003, maintain their unobtrusive sponsorship presence through logo placement and in-kind ‘boots’ (Look, that car is a Vauxhall… and that one.  Oh, and that one over there.  Wait a minute…), strengthening their already-solid links with the arts community as seen through their Vauxhall Collective projects.

‘What could I buy?’, I hear you cry.  Well, at the end of a queue the length of a football pitch, Sir Peter Blake was selling signed found art prints for a very reasonable £30 and ‘signing things’ for £5 (how very Duchamp), donating all proceeds to charity; over at the Gavin Turk camp, prints of his inked-up boots walking across paper were being sold for anything between £200 to £900 (if my credit-card machine spying is anything to go on); and lurking in the farthest corner were Snakeskin Jackets, who were premiering ‘Paintball by Numbers’ – £10 for 5 shots and a framed artwork.   After your cultural appetite was sated, you could wander over to the chaps from St John who took care of the real deal with ox-heart buns and mini eccles cakes (I didn’t), Kitty Travers for home made pea-pod ice-cream (I did), or the 2-for£5 Martini tent (I definitely did).  I satisfied my constant desire to purchase with quick yet fulfilling visits to Harry Burden’s Evil Art Market and Club Shepway.

The Art Car Boot Fair is not to be missed – put it in your diary for next year at once!

Rose Enright