London-based artist and filmmaker Hetain Patel has a peculiar hobby: creating Spider-Man costumes. One of them, "The Other Suit" (2015), was meticulously crafted at his kitchen table over several months, using YouTube tutorials as his guide. Before that, Patel turned his first car, an old Fiesta, into a Transformer-like sculpture with his father's help in their family garage in Bolton, this time without following any tutorials, but through a trial and error process.
While some might see this as sheer madness, those ones among us blessed with a creative fire understand that it's a mix of obsession and passion that fuels such projects. Often, the results of our creative endeavors transcend mere hobby work, reaching a level of craftsmanship that qualifies them as genuine artworks.
Inspired by these principles and by his own hobbies, Patel launched a UK-wide call-out in February 2024, inviting the public to share their favorite pastimes. Over the months, he collected works from mosaicists, ceramicists, doll modifiers, scrapbookers, and yarn bombers, as well as collectors of the most disparate items, from postcards to cigarette packets and carrier bags.
The culmination of this exploration is a recently opened exhibition, "Come As You Really Are," running until October 20 at the pop-up Hobby Cave in Grants, Croydon. This venue, formerly a Wetherspoons, once occupied two floors of Grant's department store.
Curated by Hetain Patel and commissioned and produced by Artangel, the exhibition is a joyous assortment of objects created, modified, or collected by hobbyists across the UK, displayed alongside new and existing works by Patel. Among the highlights is Patel's Spider-Man suit and the remarkable "Somerset Road" (2024), a Ford Escort tufted by the artist in the pattern of his grandmother's living room carpet. Through them, Patel also highlights the manual labor often carried out by migrant communities like his family.
The event features an eclectic mix, including cosplayer costumes, quilts, shelves filled with mini-ponies, lead soldiers, Star Wars fighters, Polly Pocket toys, bottles of fruit-infused gin, dolls, origami, weavings, embroideries, K-pop merchandise, and mineral samples. Patel has also created a film celebrating hobbies that includes dancers, drone flyers, and custom car owners.
While not the first of its kind - consider Grayson Perry's TV show "Grayson’s Art Club," a program that invited UK makers to share their creations - Patel's approach is on a larger and broader scale.
Art purists might see this as chaotic, with accumulation being a key criterion in displaying some items and collections, and might argue that some pieces do not qualify as artwork. However, the 14,000 loaned items from dedicated hobbyists are an expression of creativity, affirming our existence as humans and celebrating those who dedicate their time to their passions.
Yet there is another reason behind it all: on social media, crafts and hobbies are often presented as ways to make money. This can become a source of stress and anxiety for those crafters who then use their creations as content for their social media pages. By focusing on likes, followers, and monetization, hobbies lose their essence as personal and creative outlets. Instead, they become another form of digital performance, subject to the pressures and expectations of the online world.
This event shifts instead the focus back to the joy of the hobby itself. It celebrates those who keep their hobbies - symbols of freedom of expression and ingenuity - to themselves. These hobbies are labors of love, offering an alternative to a world dominated by technological screens and conformist trends dictating what we must wear, drink, eat, and do in our spare time. In this way, Patel reaffirms the power of hobbies as something that offer an opportunity for escapism, a space to share passions, or even to perform an entirely different identity or as an invitation to explore novel ways of connecting with one another.
In an age where social media can make us passive consumers of content, constantly scrolling and comparing our lives to others, "Come As You Really Are" is a reminder of the active, hands-on pleasure that hobbies provide. The exhibition encourages people to engage in activities that bring genuine satisfaction and fulfillment, free from the pressures of external validation (even though here they do receive external validation actually...). By showcasing these private passions in a public space, the exhibition invites us to reconnect with our own creativity and the simple joy of making something for the love of it.
Last but not least, "Come As You Really Are" also emphasizes one principle: there's safety in numbers. Presenting all these works collectively and without labels counters detractors who might dismiss some items as mere crafts or hobbies. Instead, the event is a joyful celebration of the unstoppable nature of self-expression and a critique of the elitist art world. Museums looking for new visitors and demographics should indeed also seek pieces that engage people in different ways, like Patel did.
"Come As You Really Are" is accompanied by a program of workshops offering natural henna tattoo sessions, miniature pottery making, quilling workshops, superhero mask crafting, and puppet making. Can't visit the event and don't have a hobby? Find an activity you love to fill your spare time - the first results may not be exhibition-worthy, but the sheer joy of making something will make you feel like an artist.
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