Letter: In Brief

Sir: Thanks for putting down a marker (Leading article, 5 August) for British curators who are seeking new audiences to their exhibitions. The Guggenheim's current show opened just after the Barbican closed its hugely popular "Art of the Harley", which featured 30 of the best customised Harley-Davidsons on the road today. The 70,000 visitors who saw the show revealed a very different profile to our usual audience, containing a large percentage of first-time visitors, quite a number of whom seemed to be tattooed and dressed from head-to-toe in black (leather, not Armani). Even if Cool Britannia might no longer be flavour of the month, the Barbi can, even if the Guggi can't.

JOHN HOOLE

Barbican, London EC2