There’s a bit of a debate going on as far as modern art is concerned, particularly about the continuing relevance of all this new Brit Mod stuff. Now, I’m all for this modern stuff, it’s generally more interesting and real to me than those bloody Turner seascapes that I was dragged off to see when I was smaller. And I totally get the notion that it’s not just about what it looks like, it’s about what it means in relation to the continuing artistic discourse, but I don’t think that that means that any old pile of dross should qualify as art simply because some tosser says so. Just because Magritte said Ceci n’est pas une pipe, doesn’t mean that your spastic outpouring of junk is automatically art.

Take the last Turner Prize, which supposedly reflects a body of work exhibited over a year. At least three quarters of that was unmitigated super-pretentious art wank (see the fine close up of the truly uninspiring Mannikin and String diorama from Cathy Wilkes). Even when it was explained by people from incredibly erudite art magazines who seem to still believe in the sort of pseudo-communist politico drivel that launched the Baader Meinhoff group it was still rubbish. At least the winner, Mark Leckey, had included a half hour movie in which he attempted to explain what the hell he was up to and was able to relate it to Road Runner cartoons.

So we’re left with the thought that actually most modern British art is pretty cruddy. And certainly if you drop down to the Tate Modern that’s pretty much what you’ll find, some pretty crud art that’s not very inspiring, set in a gallery that, the Turbine Room aside, is ill prepared to display art. Its rooms are too high and not wide enough and badly lit and I still can’t figure out why the escalators don’t go to all the floors.

In contrast the Saatchi Gallery is great. It looks like it’s been designed to show art, rather than just cut up to make a bunch of rooms. The space doesn’t attempt to overwhelm the art and it feels like it’s been intelligently lit. There are also multiple points of views in some of the rooms, with space to view the art from floor level and from above. And the art is, frankly, a lot better. Admittedly it’s not up to the class of personal favourites like Shark (see fantastic Lego version by The Little Artists (John Cake and Darren Neave)), Blood Head (more fab Lego) or, best of all, Jake and Dinos Chapman’s HELL (see super video), which single-handedly validates the many, many hours I spent ineptly making Tamiya models, but when it’s good, it’s a cut above Leckey.

The current Unveilled exhibition at the Saatchi gallery is challenging not only in terms of its opposition to Brit Mod, but also in terms of our perception of Middle Eastern culture. Installations like Ghost, with its ranks of space-blanketed worshippers, slowly bowing from the back of the room like a tsunami of genuflection, are both powerful and hilarious. Powerful in the sense that they demonstrate the scale and majesty of communal worship, a theme reiterated in Neal Stephenson’s latest novel Anathem (go read it); hilarious in so far as it looks like a host of Star Wars Jawas oogling the latest piece of technology they can steal.

And while there’s a lot that’s pointless and rather tedious in Unveilled – most of the paintings and the really childish Hey Look Here’s Palestine diorama – there are some great pieces. I enjoyed the plastic scultures of Diana Al-Hadid, which reminded me of City of Lost Children, the uber-detailing of Laleh Khorramian’s Eden, the architectural bits n bobs of Marwan Rechmaoui and the wild hairstyles and gowns of Hayv Kahramen. I wasn’t so keen on the disturbing dubious sexuality room.

There’s also the bonus of Will Ryman’s The Bed (a proper papier mache slap in the face to Tracey Emin) and the mad geezers who rule the world from the comfort of their wheelchairs. Could you want anything more?