36 top things to do in London this week

This week you can help celebrate five years of NTS radio at live performances and DJ sets in Dalston, discover thousands of artefacts gathered for the epic Rolling Stones exhibition and catch free film screenings in Camberwell. Keep reading for more magic in the capital!

Things to do 

Christie's Lates: Drawing From Life, Christie's South Kensington, Tue, free. Study, contemplate and sketch the human form amongst art in the latest auction including pieces from Gerhard Richter and Ai Wei Wei. Christie's flock of experts will also be on hand to discuss collecting art.

Yoga at St Stephen's, St Stephen with St John, Tue, free. Holy, moly it's a miracle! We've found a free yoga class open to all abilities with mats provided and no advanced booking needed.

The Rolling Stones: Exhibitionism, Saatchi Gallery, Tue-Thu, £19-£21, £12-19 concs. A major exhibition devoted to the rock ’n’ roll survivors, with thousands of rare items and photos.

Learn to Sew: Liberty Handkerchief, Fashion and Textile Museum, Wed, £15. Discover original Liberty textile designs and learn how to hand sew and monogram a handkerchief with Britain's best florals.

Food Photography Masterclass, Three's Discovery Islington, Thu, free. Bake Off winner turned pro cake whizz Edd Kimber spills on all the secret tips that won him his 102k Instagram followers. 

The Pancakes and Booze Art Show, Studio Spaces E1, Thu, free. Cripes (or should that be 'Crepes!') - this looks good. Body painting, live music, walls heaving with art and all-you-can-eat pancakes.

Style Me in Seconds, Old Street Station, all week, free. Professional stylists (who count Emeli Sandé and Victoria Beckham as clients) will be let loose on the public at Old Street Station, refreshing looks with a quick flick through stock from London's many charity shops.

…or check out more events happening in London this week.

Eating and drinking

Wandsworth Common Beer Festival, Le Gothique, Wed, £5, £1 CAMRA. Annual festival featuring 150 beers from across Britain, as well as wine and cider. In its eighth year, the festival is still child- and dog-friendly, and still does lovely festival grub for between beers.

Pizza Pilgrims x Forza Win, Forza Win Peckham, Thu, £25. Italian supperclubbers Forza Win started out life on a Shoreditch rooftop, serving pizza made by their pals Pizza Pilgrims. They now have a permanent home in Peckham but are going back to where it all began with a month of four-course, pizza-laden meals.

London Coffee Festival, Old Truman Brewery, Thu, £14.50 adv. Returning for 2016, the London Coffee Festival is the UK’s largest coffee and artisan food event, a celebration of London's vibrant coffee culture featuring gourmet coffee, speciality tea, artisan food and demonstrations from world-class baristas.

Chocolate Sensations, Kew Gardens, all week, prices vary. Enjoy sensory workshops that delve into our emotional response to chocolate, make your own cookies, design your own choccie wrapper, follow the free Lindt Gold Bunny Flavour Trail map or simply bow down in humble servitude to the cacao trees in The Palm House.

…or check out the latest restaurant reviews.

Comedy

The Comedian's Comedian Podcast with Stuart Goldsmith, Soho Theatre, TONIGHT, £10. Slick comic Stuart Goldsmith hosts this fascinating podcast in which he sits down with a fellow stand-up and explores their creative process.

Kieran Hodgson: Lance, Soho Theatre, Tue-Wed, £15, £12.50 concs. A beautifully written hour, with Hodgson focusing on his teenage hero Lance Armstrong who helps the Yorkshire lad through the tough times of mountain bike races and going to university.

Tom Stade: You're Welcome, Leicester Square Theatre, Wed-Thu, £17.50, £16 concs. Ultra laidback Canadian comic Tom Stade is back on tour, after appearances on 'Michael McIntyre's Comedy Roadshow' and 'Live at the Apollo'.

…or check out all the critics’ choice comedy shows.

Live music and nightlife

Protomartyr, 100 Club, TONIGHT, £10. Do you dig the spiky indie energy of Parquet Courts but find them just a bit too zany and slackerish? Then check out the passionate post-punk assault of fast-rising Detroit dudes Protomartyr.

Gregory Porter, various locations, Mon, Thu, from £35. US soul-jazz singer Porter has had critics, fans and musicians raving thanks to his stunning Grammy-nominated debut ‘Water’, and he’s the real deal live too.

NTS Is 5, Efes Snooker Club, Wed, adv £7. Live performances and DJ sets to celebrate the ace Dalston radio station's fifth birthday. 

West Norwood Cassette Library, Corsica Studios, Thu, adv £3. Brilliantly creative muso West Norwood Cassette Library can break out anything from Paradise Garage-style disco to deep, analogue house to Aphex-ish electronica.

…or take a look at all the live music events in London this week.

Film

Anachron Film Club: Films from the Swinging 60s, Muse Gallery, Tue, free. Two psychedelic oddities to spin your head around in the grooviest possible way.

Camberwell Free Film Festival: ‘Carnival of Souls’, St. Giles Church, Wed, free. Another top-notch free movie from this festival of free movies. This eerie slice of unintended outsider art is one of the most otherworldly films ever made, following a young woman haunted by demonic visions after surviving a car accident.

The Overlook Screening Room: ‘Girlfriends’, The Water Poet, Thu, free. A terrific choice from this free monthly film club, ‘Girlfriends’ is a recently rediscovered 1978 New York indie whose director Claudia Weill also deserves far greater recognition.

Or at the cinema...

Victoria ★★★★☆ Four local Berliners recruit a thrill-seeking Spanish woman (Laia Costa) to be their getaway driver for a bank robbery.

Eddie the Eagle ★★☆☆☆ This mostly fictional comedy biopic takes liberties with the legend of British Olympic oddball Eddie Edwards.

…or see all of the latest releases.

Theatre

Calculating Kindness, Camden People's Theatre, Tue-Thu, 10-£12. The juicy but dense story of tragic scientist George Price.

Les Blancs, Olivier Theatre, all week, £15-£35. Yaël Farber directs this forgotten classic from the short-lived giant Lorraine Hansberry.

Right Now, Bush Theatre, all week, £15-£20. Brilliant, darkly hilarious new play about a couple struggling with loss and awful neighbours.

CircusFest 2016, Roundhouse, all week, £7.50-£29.50. CircusFest returns with a programme that's bursting through the rafters with high-flying UK and international circus.

…or see our theatre critics’ choices.

This week's best new art

Blair Thurman: Mature Blonde, Almine Rech Gallery, Tue-Thu, free. New work by a US artist who draws on car culture to come up with cool, ‘pop minimalist’ art.

Franciszka & Stefan Themerson: Books, Camera, Ubu, Camden Arts Centre, Tue-Thu, free. Polish husband and wife creative team Franciszka and Stefan Themerson wore so many different artistic hats, across such a range of disciplines, it’s quite astonishing.

Emotional Supply Chains, Zabludowicz Collection, Thu, free. This group show brings together a group of contemporary artists who explore how our identities are constructed in the age of the information superhighway.

Eva Grubinger: Five Problems, Bloomberg SPACE, all week, free. Bloomberg Space has a new five-part series of shows titled 'Physical Information', which looks at how objects have the power to generate alternative experiences. First up is Austrian sculptor Eva Grubinger.

John Latham: The Spray Paintings, Lisson Gallery, all week, free. The Lisson’s seventh exhibition of the late British conceptualist focuses on his spray-painted works.

Shelagh Wakely: Spaces Between Things, Richard Saltoun, all week, free. Overlooked for much of her lifetime, the British artist (1932-2011) finally got her dues with a great retrospective at Camden Arts Centre in 2014. This smaller show follows on from that with a selection of Wakely’s delicate sculpture and installation art.

…or see all London art reviews.

And finally

Win... the perfect London weekend in Seven Dials or tickets for Festival No.6

Grab... £15 tickets to Spirited Sermon at Reverend JW Simpson - includes three cocktails

Book… these gigs while you still can

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