Review

Bob Marley One Love Experience: Saatchi Gallery, London (Feb 2-18 March)

There's a distinct celebratory feeling as soon as you enter this innovative exhibition and it's no wonder as the topic is none other than the life of Bob Marley. A towering cultural icon of the twentieth century wonderfully portrayed by the Marley family in conjunction with Jonathan Shank of Terrapin Station and Ollie Rosenblatt of Senbla.

Room 1, (of which there are nine) the entrance room, is dominated by a large 10 feet tall slice of Vinyl and scraps of lyrics, an acoustic guitar and his famous denim shirt are on show along with blown-up artwork of his recorded output. It's vibrant but the real fun starts in the one love forest next door where the Jamaican foothills are recreated where you can have a swing by a waterfall and luxuriate in a steamy and eerie Jamaican forest.

The immersive site gathers steam in the Soul Shakedown Studio, where Bluetooth headphones invite you to enjoy concert footage on vast video screens - good to see Peter Tosh too, a pivotal component in the early days of The Wailers. The Instagram generation will be happy as well, there are lots of photo opportunities with some cleverly designed installations to participate in and the joyousness this artist exuded is in full effect.

Football was central to Marley too and it was great to see those iconic photos of him and his mates playing in Battersea Park. I happened to bump into poet Benjamin Zephaniah and asked him if he had met the man in question? "Yes," he said, "I played football with him in that very park - his team lost!".

Needless to say, there are many highlights here that represent the man’s incredible life and with half term coming up this is an ideal place to take the family and learn a thing or two about an incredible musician and artist, it runs till the 18th of April.
Words Emrys Baird