Stephen Appleby at Space Station Sixty Five

Tucked away in a yard off Kennington Lane is Space Station Sixty Five, an airy little gallery with exceedingly friendly staff. If, like me, you wondered what happened to Steven Appleby after apparently disappearing from the pages of The Guardian newspaper, then this is the exhibition for you. It's the exhibition for you even if you didn't wonder that. It's full of funny, warm and often slightly disturbing art that massages your sense of normality while quite comfortably straddling the boundaries between that, and what some people would regard as deviance.

There is so much to see and be inspired by here. Steven's line drawings seem to have been drawn with a pin: wiry black lines on a white page, sometimes with a smudge of colour flown in. Sometimes, they read from left to right, sometimes upside down and the right way up, sometimes tempting your eyes to dart about, as though it is you yourself having these thoughts and daydreams in your mind's eye. 

The text is part of the whole, playing with words and ideas (why didn't I think of that? Maybe I did, but Steven has articulated it in real life). Everything is challenged, just when it's looking really cosy. The work is sexy, sexual, real, and dreamy all at once, with a 'normality' in the representation of humans and a sense of humour underpinning the whole that makes you laugh your way into hidden areas of your soul.

Steven's been working as an illustrator, graphic novelist, musical collaborator and practically anything else creative you can think of. I bought his graphic novel after being riveted by just a quick glance inside it. There is much more here than just the line drawings, too. What a breath of fresh air he/she/they is. He doesn't care what you call her: what a wonderful reaction to the screaming bigots! 

It made my day seeing this. 

I messaged the Offsprogs straight away to go and see it. I'm going to go again (it's on till December), because it turned that frown upside down, especially because we went to the Regency Café for a late lunch afterwards. 

And the sun was shining too.