My mother had been invited to exhibit at Parallax Art Fair in the beautiful old town hall in Chelesa/London and I had the chance to spend the weekend there with her. The schedule was pretty tight and there wasn’t a lot of time for real sightseeing or discovering London’s amazing attractions – but we made good use of the time and had a pretty amazing experience.

It has been my first ever time in London (and her’s too) and so I was really excited about what to discover. I took some gear and my camera with me and we spent Thursday afternoon and Friday morning in town, walking around our neighborhood, some cool spots that you don’t want to miss should you be in town and we tasted some of the great national and international food you can find in the city. We even found the time to visit the famous Tate Museum and saw some amazing artists such as Picasso or Dali. It was a real treat for my mom since she is a painter as well.

Since my mother and I had never been on a trip alone, we were really looking forward to this experience and I must say that it was a very special treat to me. After all it is because of her that I could come and visit London.

Thursday afternoon was a bit rainy but we had the chance to see a lot nevertheless. Our first walk brought us to Oxford Street with all the shops and restaurants. After a nice walk and some beautiful impressions of the neighborhood, we took the tube towards the financial district and London Bridge and took a long walk from there towards the Tower Bridge which you can see in the photo on top of this article. It was already dark when we got to the Thames but the view was spectacular.

Once back at our apartment (a special thanks to the people from London Natural Health Centre in Theobalds Road and for letting us use the apartment and Stuart for organizing this for us), we crashed and spend our first night. On Friday morning we went to Covent Garden Market which was amazing and then basically walked down to the river to see the London Eye, the Big Ben and a bit later the Tate Museum. The views were stunning and the weather was pretty awesome which we didn’t expect from London.

After that we had a lovely lunch and headed back towards our apartment to get ready for the exhibition. The schedule was such that we had to hang her art in the afternoon and then there was a private show the same evening for special guests. On Saturday morning the fair opened at 10.30 for another private exhibition and then at around 11 am the public was invited in. We basically spent the whole day talking to visitors, other artists and the press which was really nice. The variety of art presented was huge starting from paintings up to sculptures and textile work.

With a total amount of 200 international artists, the fair was pretty big and location couldn’t have been more appropriate. Chelsea’s old town hall is a beautiful piece of architecture and it was the right place for this type of event.

We also met some really nice people exhibiting next to us. Dora Williams, Andrés Zanotti from Argentina and Isabella Beaubien from Canada had some amazing art to present and were a wonderful company during the exhibition time and we had a lot of fun.

On Sunday the doors were opened to the public at 11 am again we spent the day chatting with people and having a good time. As a surprise my good friend Stuart who I hadn’t seen in 11 years visited us although he was really sick. But he really enjoyed the show and he was pretty amazed to meet my mom and see her work live for the first time.

In the evening at 5 pm the show was over and we started packing. Our flight was leaving only a couple of hours later and we were pretty exhausted. Still – after letting everything sink, I feel pretty happy about the weekend and the overall experience. It’s been a very different trip but one worth making. I will definitely come back and spend more time in London because I have been quite impressed with the city and the people there.

The individual photos of London can be found in my portfolio. Most of them are in black and white because I wanted to give them a more timeless look and since the architecture speaks for itself, it works great.