Come As You Really Are

“There is a vulnerability in sharing something so personal, which often happens in private spaces around the responsibilities of daily life. But there is also a tremendous power in sharing collectively, which is at the heart of this project. I hope people join us in this celebration of the unstoppable nature of self-expression that is demonstrated by our hobbies.” - Hetain Patel

Come As You Really Are by Hetain Patel features thousands of objects created, modified or collected by hobbyists across the UK, shown alongside a new artist film. Each hobby represents a decision to commit valuable time to living life on one's own terms in a society dominated by consumerism.

The project began with a nationwide call-out inviting members of the public to share the activity to which they dedicate their spare time. Standing shoulder to shoulder with handmade submissions by hobbyists are new and existing works by Patel. The Other Suit, 2015, is a Spiderman suit crafted at the kitchen table over months, following tutorials on YouTube. It is presented along with Fiesta Transformer, 2013, a robot sculpture built from Patel's first car with the help of his father in the family garage in Bolton. Somerset Road, 2024, a Ford Escort tufted by the artist in the pattern of his grandmother’s living room carpet, has been created for the exhibition. These time-consuming handmade objects directly echo the manual labour often carried out by migrant communities such as Patel’s family, while their hybridity points towards the new possibilities that emerge when we challenge and defy convention.

Come As You Really Are presents a variety of hobbies that showcase an individual's freedom of expression and ingenuity, and in doing so broadens our perception of who gets to be called creative and where the impulse to create stems from. At the heart of this project is a nationwide community of people whose labours of love are a lens through which the artist presents an alternative portrait of the UK.

Find out more about the upcoming partner presentations here.

Image: Hetain Patel, Somerset Road, 2024, installed next to quilts and carpets by hobbyists at Come As You Really Are. Photography by Thierry Bal.

Watch Hetain Patel talk about Come As You Really Are, an ambitious project featuring thousands of objects that are made, modified, and collected by hobbyists across the UK. 

Open in Croydon until 20 October 2024, the exhibition presents a variety of hobbies that showcase an individual's freedom of expression and ingenuity. At the heart of this project is a nationwide community of people whose labours of love are a lens through which the artist presents an alternative portrait of the UK.

Video footage and editing by Tilly Shiner. Sound mixing by House of Noise.

During the closing week of Come As You Really Are, artist Hetain Patel and Mariam Zulfiqar, Director of Artangel, discussed the development of this expansive project at an event held at Grants, Croydon. The pair reflected on behind the scenes aspects of the exhibition, from the research stage where the artist and the Artangel team travelled nationwide, visiting conventions and meeting with hobbyists, through to the installation in Croydon, which amassed over 14,000 loaned objects.

When we put out a call-out to invite people to submit what they do, we were aware that the tone needed to be very friendly and open. We were thinking about language. We're not aiming it at a contemporary art audience or a niche audience in a gallery sense. We want it to be open to anyone and everyone. 

Listen to Hetain Patel in conversation with Mariam Zulfiqar here. 

Photography by Tarlan Lotfizadeh 

Recorded at BAFTA, London following a screening of Come As You Really Are, artist Hetain Patel was joined by Mark Rappolt Editor-in-Chief of ArtReview in conversation, to explore the themes of the film and wider project. Together, they discussed how the deployment of Hollywood-style visuals elevates the hobbyists and their activities, lending cinematic weight to everyday passions. They talk about how the work navigates identity, cultural heritage, and the relationship between migrant culture and hand-making in the artist's practice.

The work is about taking a leap of faith, or a leap into the unknown. And despite the discrepancies there can be between an immigrant generation and a UK-born generation, I still have a huge, insane respect for what my parents' generation did.

Listen to Hetain Patel In Conversation with Mark Rappolt here.

Photography by Tarlan Lotfizadeh

Take a deep dive into the hobbies that preoccupy individuals across the UK with our Digital Guide, available on Bloomberg Connects. Hear from the hobbyists, see the their various creations and collections made, modified, and gathered in their spare time, and find out more about the online platforms where they are sharing their work.

The exhibition launches in London in July 2024 at Grants, a Grade-II listed, former department store in Croydon once famed for its tailoring.

This building was opened in 1895 and was once home to a store run by William and Richard Grant with over 60 departments including fashion and bespoke tailoring, hairdressing salons, china and glass, hardware, several restaurants and outside catering.

Croydon was the location of the first major international airport in the United Kingdom and Grants was visited by many overseas customers to attend regular fashion shows and buy goods from the store.

The Grant family sold the store in 1983, before it finally closed in 1987. The exterior of the building was restored in 2000 including the repair of stained-glass windows. The building still shows details of the goods that Grants would sell including "haberdashery" and "silks". The interior of the building has changed use over the decades, while the façade still portrays the building’s connection to handmade textile items.

The exhibition continues across the UK from February 2025 onwards.

Image courtesy of Croydon Archives

“Hobbies to me feel like a mini protest against the powers that control our time and tell us what to do and who to be."

Hetain Patel is a London-based artist and filmmaker, whose work challenges reductive categorisations of identity and art. Often rooted in personal experience, and that of his immigrant family, Patel’s work invites us to see identity as multi-dimensional and complex, linked as much to what we choose to do, as to that which is assigned by birth, heritage, social norms, and conventions.

Image: (above) Portrait of Hetain Patel, photography by Sam Bush. (left) Hetain Patel sitting next to his Spiderman costume at Come As You Really Are. Photography by Lia Toby.

Come As You Really Are is a shape-shifting project that brings together a nationwide network of arts and culture organisations. Following the inaugural exhibition in Croydon, the project will be presented with our partners across the UK from Spring 2025 onwards:

15 February - 27 April 2025
Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea 
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22 March – 6 July 2025
Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art, Sunderland
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29 March – 7 June 2025
Grundy Art Gallery, Blackpool

24 May - 2 August 2025
Barnsley Civic

5-6 July 2025
National Festival of Making (with exhibition partner Blackburn Museum, dates TBC) 

12 July – 28 September 2025
Wolverhampton Art Gallery

October 2025
Centre for Contemporary Art Derry~Londonderry

November 2025
Tate St Ives, Cornwall

December 2025 – January 2026
Inverness Museum and Gallery

2026
Museum of Making, Derby Museums Trust

Factory International, Manchester

Dates TBC
Hospitalfield, Arbroath

For a chance to participate in an upcoming presentation, share details of your hobby here.

Image: Installation of Come As You Really Are at the Hobby Cave in Grants, Croydon. Photography by Thierry Bal.

Patel’s work has always invited its viewers to consider how personal interests shape the self, forever going beyond the labels and societal norms, with this exhibition shining a spotlight on that ethos in full force... It’s the perfect way to rethink what we value in a consumer-driven world and celebrate the creativity that thrives when we’re passionate about something. - Jack Rattenbury, Secret London, 18 July 2024

As well as a creative exercise, Patel sees [the exhibition] as a form of protest, of pushback against forces of authority and control. – Alexander Morrison, The Art Newspaper, 24 January 2024

“The empowering thing about hobbies,” Patel said ... “is choice, about doing something on our own terms.” Those are wise words. It’s so easy to be defined and hemmed in by your job or circumstances. A hobby sets your psyche free. For those few hours each week you really are where you want to be. – Richard Morrison, The Times, 25 January 2024

Every day, millions of us dedicate time to our favourite hobbies; as a way to express ourselves and be creative. Whether you make it, modify it or collect it, we want to hear from you.

Fill out the short form at the link below to tell us a little about yourself, what you do in your spare time and why you do it, for a chance to a future presentation of this nationwide project.

Tell us your hobby

Commissioned and produced by Artangel.

In partnership with

Factory International, Manchester; Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea; Grundy Art Gallery, Blackpool; Museum of Making, Derby Museums Trust; National Festival of Making with Blackburn Museum & Art Gallery; Wolverhampton Art Gallery; Barnsley Civic; Inverness Museum and Art Gallery; Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art, Sunderland; CCA Derry~Londonderry; Hospitalfield, Arbroath and Tate St Ives.

Supported by Artangel's Guardian Angels.

With special thanks to Dasha Shenkman OBE.

With thanks to Creative Lives and Croydon Council.

Artangel is generously supported using public funding by Arts Council England, and the private patronage of The Artangel International Circle, Special Angels, The Guardian Angels and The Company of Angels.