We bring you our guide to living well in the world’s capitals, from exhibitions to cinema, food, drink, fashion, music and beyond. Just call it culture and take it, it’s yours.

LONDON, FRIDAY 31st JANUARY – SUNDAY 2nd FEBRUARY 2014

“When you’re chewing on life’s gristle, don’t grumble, give a whistle.”
As the famous Monty Python saying wisely states, it’s a good idea to keep your gaze held firmly on the more positive aspects of life.

No we’re not recommending you join the Hare Krishna movement this week, but perhaps take a trip down to Mayfair’s Hauser and Wirth gallery and check out photographer Alex Van Gelder’s new exhibition Meat Portraits.

It does exactly what it says on the tin, though Spam this ain’t, showing in immense detail a beautiful collection of posed abattoir rejects, which he managed to procure from a slaughterhouse he lived by in Benin. Pay closer attention to the stunning colours and intricate anatomical patterns in this series of works you’ll quickly lose the sense of nausea and forget you’re staring at a deceased goat’s unspeakables.

While you’re there try to grab one of the few copies of his phenomenal book, Armed Forces, in which Louise Borgeois’s hands become the subject of eighteen portraits taken in the last year of her life. She once said, “I am not what I am, I am what I do with my hands.”

Alex Van Gelder: Meat Portraits
Until 8th February 2014, Hauser & Wirth London, 23 Savile Row London, W1S 2ET

Being A Man
New to the South Bank this year is a three-day festival of talks, screenings, music and performances derived from the efforts of over 250 men who took part in ‘think-ins’ to discuss what it means to be a man in this day and age. Highlights include talks by thoroughly modern gents such as artist Grayson Perry and poet Simon Armitage, covering subjects such as male identity, fatherhood, online addictions and sex.

Great if you’ve got something you want to get off of your chest and a groundbreaking new platform for us all to have some perspective on life: it is January after all.

Being A Man at The South Bank Centre,
Friday 31st January 2014 – Sunday 2nd February 2014

Valentino Wool and Cashmere-Blend Jacket £1,390

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