If you were wandering round Bankside on Saturday night you might have been bemused to see words appearing on the facade of Tate Modern and wondering if someone spiked your drink. But there was nothing to fear as it was just MC Yan, who rocked China by being the first to use Chinese characters in his graffiti, bringing Laser tagging, the new, high-tech future of graffiti, to London. Part of the Red Mansion Foundation's Down......

Augh, it's mid-September already?? Seriously, where did this summer go? Depending on what stage of life you are in, it's either back to school time (shopping! huzzah!), 9-5 work as usual time, or dentures and Ovaltine time. Either way, here are some clever and cheap ways to make the most of the transition from summer to autumn, no matter where you spend those daytime hours. Monday: Art galleries are always free, and we have......

We went a little cinema-crazy in this week's version of London On The Cheap, but sun-bathing in the flickering light of the silver screen is such a delightful escape on a rainy summer day. You get the best of both worlds -- all the lazy delights of a lie-in film night while still getting out on the town. All film screenings featured are free, and of course, there's always a pub nearby for an......

Back in the days when Bankside Power Station actually burned oil, it stored its fuel supply in a trio of enormous round tanks lying beneath the rear of the building. Nobody can afford such a quantity of oil these days, but the tanks are still down there, and Tate Modern has big plans for them. Last weekend, small groups of museum members toured the eerie underbelly of the institution for a look at things......

We're in the thick of it now: full-on tourist season is here, and while you may be fighting your way through thicker lunchtime throngs than ever, elbowing open London guidebooks and tube maps out of your way at every corner, we've got a round-up of decidedly non-touristy and inexpensive fun to be had this week. Monday: Free in-store gigs, hath sweeter words ever been written? The HMV on Oxford Street tonight is featuring a......

It's far too nice to be inside tonight so we can't help but suggest you mosey on down to the river and enjoy the rays. Head down to the Tate Modern and enjoy the Street Art exhibition that's been daubing the external walls of the Tate Modern since for the last month of so. Then talk a short stroll to the nearby The Anchor pub and enjoy their riverside beer garden till sunset.......

Image courtesy of Richard Parmiter via the Londonist Flickr pool taken at the Nissan Qashqai Challenge Mountain Bike Freeriding final held outside the Tate Modern museum last Saturday.......

2008 is shaping up to be the year that street art went truly mainstream in London. Currently, you can see Banksy at Selfridges, a half-mile tunnel of talent in Waterloo and, for the eagle-eyed, that subtle bit of wall painting at the Tate Modern. Street art is also getting big in the more literal sense. Here are just a few of the supersized pieces around town at the moment. At the top of the......

If you've been down Tate Modern way recently, you've probably noticed some new additions to the river-facing wall: the Street Art exhibition, which we mentioned back in April, officially opens on Friday 23rd of May, and the pieces have been slowly but steadily revealing themselves over the past couple of weeks. The tech-savvy Tate staff are live blogging as the artworks go up, and getting the artists themselves to throw in their pictures too.......

Marcel Duchamp Fountain 1917 Tate © Succession Marcel Duchamp/ Paris and DACS, London 2007 This exhibition highlights the work of three justifiably important 20th century artists: Picabia, Man Ray and Duchamp. Let us stop you right there. The show hasn't gone dada over a urinal. Although a 1960s replica of the infamous urinal does feature. This exhibition shows the progression of these three artists through the earnest art movements of the first half of......

Snoopy, nosey or just plain curious Londoners will be relieved: the Metropolitan Archive Office is to reopen after a revamp. David Hockney has donated some very big trees to the Tate Modern. A senior BNP official plonker would seem to endorse rape. Hold us back, hold us back…. TV presenter Mark Speight is missing. Not all teenagers are bad. Two of them thwarted a pair of granny bashers. A church in Newington Green has......

In the week that Doris' crack gets filled in, Tate Modern has announced plans for a rethink of the building's river-facing facade. Between May and August, a group of the world's most acclaimed street artists will be allowed to daub their designs across designated 15x12 metre areas on the north side of the former power station, the first time the exterior has been used in such a way. According to curator Cedar Lewisohn, the......

Following on from Doris Salcedo's giant subterranean crack (which two art-lovers managed to fall into), Tate Modern has announced that the next Unilever Series commission to fill its Turbine Hall will be by French artist Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster. Well-known for art involving audience participation, Gonzalez-Foerster’s previous work includes Séance de Shadows, where a room was filled with a series of performing shadows, and in 2007 her Promenade exhibition featuring nothing but the sound of tropical......

Swanning About Not one, but two Swan Lakes swim into town this week. Take your pick from The Russian State Ballet of Siberia's version at the New Wimbledon Theatre, or the Moscow City Ballet at The Hackney Empire. Expect world-class dance interpretations this classic love story to Tchaikovsky's sublime score at both. Topsy-turvy Theatreland Liverpool comes to Hampstead (in 3 Sisters on Hope Street), Hollywood hits Stratford (Marylin and Ella), and an Asian Tempest......

We're considering giving our notice at Londonist Towers and upping sticks for a new home. Specifically, we want to move into Jean Prouvé's Maison Tropicale. The prefabricated bungalow, standing on the front lawn outside Tate Modern, is in London as part of the excellent Prouvé retrospective at the Design Museum. Dating from the 1950s, the Maison was an attempt at creating lightweight, flat-pack housing for colonial authorities that could easily be loaded into a......

Out with the old, in with the new: Clapham Junction to get new residential towers, new train station entrance, new ticket hall, new escalators, and revamped shopping centre (not a new one? way to ruin the theme, developers). Recently rechristened Old Hoxditch to get its very own music fest. Three Graces, to which Londonist will ineloquently refer in conversations with friends as “you know – the three hugging naked ladies ”, to be exhibited......

Every day this month the Londonist team will be pointing you in the direction of a Christmas present that (with a bit of luck) you won't already have on your list. Climb up onto our collective lap and we'll see what we can move from our sack to your stockings... For the friends and family members who seem to always be busy with art exhibitions, arthouse films, dance, theatre and music of a more......

Londonist asks that most pressing of daily concerns: where to go on your lunch break. Members Room at Tate Modern Sixth Floor, Tate Modern, Bankside SE1 9TG Nearest Tube: Southwark and Blackfriars 0207 887 8888 10am-6pm (Sunday-Thursday) 10am-10pm (Friday-Saturday) Map Expect to Pay: £5-10 Rating: 8 out of 10 Not as exclusive as some of our readers might think (Tate membership joining fees start at under £50 per year and include all sorts of......

A week after opening for the Queen, St Pancras International is finally ready for the likes of us. The station has been restored beyond its former glory. Britain's answer to Central Station is ready for business. Everyone knows by now that the sumptious Euston Road frontage to the station was designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott. But what else in London did the Great Scott design? Time to dust off our old 'Stalks' series,......

As it gets closer to Halloween for LAist, a contributer recollects her tale of staring down the serial killer, Richard Ramirez, otherwise known as the Night Stalker. Must think happy thoughts -- okay, free organic chocolate chip cookies for Los Angeles -- now that's a happy thought. Other happy Los Angeles thoughts include an interview with Jack Kehler of The Big Lebowski (he was the Dude's landlord), a beautiful and magical photographic moment in Venice......

You might think the act of visiting an art gallery specifically to gawp at a hole in the ground would obviate the need to remind people not to trip over said hole. Apparently not. Mere days after the unveiling of Doris Salcedo’s Shibboleth, a 548 foot long fissure running the length of the Turbine Hall, people are already coming unstuck. One young woman reportedly fell feet-first into the exhibit and had to be dragged......

The Mayor of London wants you to stay up late. Stay up late for the Lates October season. He wanted you to cut back on sleep and catch up on culture back in May when the first Lates season was launched, now it's October, he wants you to check out the things you miss during the day in the big museums and galleries. Have you been meaning to see something at any of the......

Giant crack in the Tate Modern. Half of those living near Heathrow would quite fancy a new runway. A pretty grim account of the Menezes shooting emerges in court. Newts get evicted from Olympic site. Croydon branches of Greggs are employing bouncers, claims local news site. Crumbs, that half-baked idea really takes the biscuit, etc. etc. Image courtesy of Dartar, who gets picked again for visiting one our favourite pubs. Image via the Londonist......

No, it's not some 'attack of the giant cathedral eating spiders' B-movie filmset but the return of Maman, the giant spider sculpture by Louise Bourgeois, which originally stalked the Turbine Hall when Tate Modern opened in 2000. Bourgeois herself is now 95 and, given that much of her work is based on introspection, nostalgia, the exploration of her psyche and her parents (the spider, Maman, is of course a tribute to her mother) this......

Composer Alvin Curran and the London Symphony Orchestra will be performing Maritime Rites on the banks of the Thames outside Tate Modern and on a barge on the water itself this Friday evening. Described as a sound sculpture, Maritime Rites is a semi-improvised live event that incorporates the bells of St Pauls, the sound of traffic on the river and music associated with the Thames. As if this piece of live music and site-specific......

Do you want to go and see some Peregrine Falcons? We were enjoying ourselves today on a leisurely stroll along the South Bank (home of London's finest avian encounters) when we stumbled upon the RSPB outside the Tate Modern. They had four telescopes pointed up at the central tower. To the naked eye nothing could be seen but with the help of the lens the beautiful creatures were a delight to watch. The birds......

While the newspapers and press agencies get their knickers in a twist over coverage conditions for the Rugby World Cup which kicks off in the Stade de France tonight, we're turning our attention to a more pressing issue. Which are the best London pubs to watch the tournament in? Several of the big chains are promising full coverage: It's a Scream, O'Neills, Pitcher & Piano and Walkabout. However, what's the more discerning and individual......

Today, a very marvellous structure opens to the public in Kensington Gardens. The Serpentine Gallery Pavilion, designed by the Tate Modern sun maker, Olafur Eliasson, and award winning architect, Kjetil Thorsen has been described as a spinning top with mind-bogglingly complex geometries and a dark, spiralling ramp twisting around a shell-like auditorium, containing it within taut, twisting strings Our first impression is that is looks like a helter skelter, urban, park shark about to......

It's not the first place you would think of when looking for love but for those with a questing heart, the place to go is Euston Road. art2heart is the dating organisation that aims to bring people together through art and culture. The idea is both lofty and lovely: each month, 150 people, sometimes more, gather for monthly art2heart events held at prestigious museums or galleries where art can be admired and discussed with......

We'll let you into a secret: Londonist is a bit skint. And we all know that the wonderful events in the city can add up to quite a hefty sum. It means that we can't go and see the Dali and Film exhibition at the Tate Modern, or go and see Amy Winehouse on Friday. Booooo. Hisssss. What are we to do? Well here's a few things we found that you can do over......