World famous street artists take part in Stoke Newington exhibition

Image by RUN courtesy of Hang-Up Gallery

My granddad likes to paint penguins. Little black and white daubs with little yellow blobs for happy feet and cheeky beaks.

He hangs his penguins in his summer house at the back of the garden and I remember him standing in his summer house clutching a canvas dotted with little penguins and challenging me to give my opinion. “You study art, don’t you?” he’d say. “What’s it about then?”

Although none are present, I’m reminded of his little penguins at the opening of Wall to Wall, the latest exhibition at Hang-Up Gallery on Stoke Newington High Street.

Instead you’ll find the gallerist’s equivalent of solid gold clickbait: works by a predominantly male cast including Banksy, KAWS, Faile, Swoon, Futura, Matt Small, Shepard Fairey, David Choe and Ben Eine.

Billed as a “modern exploration of street art’s diverse nature” and “multilayered aesthetic”, it’s hard to see how the generic white-walled gallery space could be an appropriate setting for such an ambitious project.

To add a bit of grit, the exhibition is littered in odd corners with cans of spray paint, paint rollers, stickers and torn up bits of paper.

These, we are told, “are the tools of the street art craft and they are there to transport the viewer deep into the creative process of how and where art is made.”

PR spiel aside, Wall to Wall is decorated with the type of stuff you find on the walls in trendy bars across East London and beyond.

A work by Italian artist RUN, the gallery’s first ever installation, feels little more than a set change.

By its own admission, Hang-Up Gallery “only shows work by artists who are inherently creative”.

Here a limited edition Banksy print of Tesco Value Warhol pastiche Soup Can is going for £8,995. His Wrong War Placard will set you back a cool £50,000.

Take it from Andy Warhol himself: “Being good in business is the most fascinating kind of art.”

Wall to Wall is at Hang-Up Gallery, 56 Stoke Newington High Street, N16 7PB until 27 April.