The smallest art show on Earth

Portishead's Geoff Barrow has opened a tiny art gallery in Bristol the size of a large walk-in-cupboard to exhibit outsider art. The gallery, a former flower shop, has enough room to fit in three people and to hang about 12 A2-size artworks. It includes artwork by The Horrors' gangly front man Faris Badwan, 22, whose rodent-like grey animal drawing, Infant, is selling in a limited-edition run of prints for £50.

Four more of Badwan's pen-and-ink drawings, all taken from his personal sketchbooks, have also been turned into prints. Frequent Pieces is a collage of spiders, scissors, and bats, while another untitled work includes a new Horrors lyric from the song "I Can't Control Myself".

The idea for the gallery came about when Barrow fell in love with the miniscule shop on Gloucester Road. He took over the lease and opened it with his friend Tom Friend. "It stood there empty for two years until we dreamed up what to do with it," says Barrow. "To turn it into an art gallery seemed so preposterous because the venue is so small – but it works."

Barrow met Badwan this summer when he was producing The Horrors' new album Strange House, and the pair "hit it off". "He didn't talk about his artwork. He was just always in the studio sketching and I assumed he was an artist. Eventually I said I'd like to see some of his work and I asked him if he'd be interested in doing some prints for our new gallery."

Badwan, 22, who dated Peaches Geldof earlier this year, left Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design in London in 2006, to pursue his musical career. "I had to leave art school because I couldn't devote enough time to the band," he says.

Despite the band's commitments he continues to draw all the time. Armed with a sketchbook wherever he goes – "I draw with a magnifier with lights on the side of it so I can draw in the dark" – he tends to draw the same morbid objects over and over. "I wouldn't say The Horrors' music is the sonic equivalent of the drawings – but there is certainly a darker element to them."

Badwan did the cover artwork for The Charlatans' latest album You Cross My Path, as well as the inlay to The Horrors' album. "I don't know if I want to do record sleeves anymore because they never really turn out how you want them."

This is the second time that Badwan has exhibited blown-up prints from his sketchbooks. The first was in a small show last November at a gallery in Brick Lane, east London. "It was more of a first exhibition to get the first exhibition out of the way," he says. But he isn't a regular at art gallery openings. "I try to avoid visiting art galleries, partly because of my short attention span and also because I don't want to be influenced by anyone else."

Badwan recalls the night when Barrow pointed out the miniature art gallery. "We were in Bristol one night after being in the studio all day. We went past what essentially looked like a derelict hut and Geoff said it was going to be his new gallery. It didn't really look as if there was any space for anything more than a painting sideways in. My artwork is very small so perhaps in terms of scale it quite suits the space."

New work will be exhibited each month, with limited-edition print runs appearing alongside original artworks. All the prints are hand-pulled by screen printers in Bristol using the highest quality inks and archive quality recycled paper.

Original artwork in the current show includes artist/musician Stephen O'Malley of American drone metal band Sunn O, whose skull on moonscape print will also be printed on a sheet of metal. Other pieces include work by graffiti artists Mr Jago and Pinky. Marc Bessant, who did the artwork for Portishead's latest album Third, will have his print Get What You Want/Lose What You Had – of a child with boxing gloves and a bird cage on his head – for sale online. But Barrow does not pretend to be a professional art collector or even "mildly educated when it comes to art".

Between Barrow and Friend, a former A&R man at Island Records and a keen art collector, the duo have enough contacts to pull in artist musicians. "The Horrors' fan base is quite young. They can't afford £50 for a print so we are trying to do the prints a bit smaller and bit cheaper next time," says Friend.

The Friend & Co Gallery, Gloucester Road, Bristol