A UK-wide search for City of Culture which will host the Turner Prize and the Brit awards, among others, in 2013, has been launched by the Culture Secretary Ben Bradshaw.

He says we have been too London-centric for too long in our cultural life. I am not sure who the "we" he is referring to is. It can't be the towns and cities outside the capital with flourishing cultural landscapes. Take Manchester, currently hosting its second international festival and has had some fantastic reviews of new work commissioned. And it can't be Gateshead, where at the Sage the Northern Sinfonia is celebrating its 2,000th performance later this month; Edinburgh is gearing up for its annual festival, including the book festival and Fringe, and that is to mention only three. They and other cities are surely not thinking that they are too London-centric. The comment could only come from someone speaking from a London-centric perspective.

Cities and towns all over the UK work to create interesting and stimulating cultural programming, and hundreds of people engage with the cultural offerings in their areas. Perhaps it is a criticism of the media, obsessing only over what happens in the capital.

Mr Bradshaw made this comment by way of launching a national competition to find the nation's first City of Culture. The success of Liverpool as European Capital of Culture, once it was finally spearheaded by TV producer and screenwriter Phil Redmond, resulted in the kind of figures politicians love to cite: 7,000 events; £800m of economic benefit to the Liverpool city region; 15 million visits to a cultural event or attraction.

Using culture as a regeneration tool is commonplace now, but the kind of engineering promised under this new initiative is to do with selling a brand. There is no extra money. The successful city, to be chosen in 2013, will be given the rights to use the UK City of Culture brand, and tailor it to their own city. The bids will be assessed in the context of a fitting follow on from the success of Liverpool and the Cultural Olympiad; given that the latter continues to be mired in uncertainty doesn't bode well for this new initiative.

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On the face of it, Antony Gormley's latest public work of art is pleasingly democratic and novel.

Giving the fourth plinth in London's Trafalgar Square - one of the most prestigious platforms for public sculpture - over to 2,400 individuals to stand on for an hour at a time, could be viewed as radical and innovative, and on one level it is. The counter view is that it is faddish; a gimmick and without artistic merit.

There is something moving about this latest project by Gormley, an artist who has carved out a stellar reputation for routinely filling landscapes with his art instead of having it inside galleries (though he has done that too).

The individuals who are standing on the plinth can do whatever they want, as long as it's legal. They have the National Gallery as their backdrop. And what could be more monumental than standing in Trafalgar Square, a place which embodies paying homage to the traditional type of military or establishment statue?

But what makes this project interesting is that it is anti-monumental; giving the plinth over to the ordinary man or woman places value and merit in elevating the ordinary. I know it will be the spectacular and the eccentric which will capture the headlines. Tomorrow, a scientist raising awareness of lack of clean water, will spend his hour dressed as a giant poo. But I must confess that the most interesting aspect of this project will be the ones who do nothing. Who stand, or sit and reflect.

The potential for profound transformation of some kind is great. And for the viewer too. What would you do with your plinth moment?

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I have always thought the River Thames divided London, but a truly stunning view from the ninth floor of the multi-storey car park in Peckham Rye shows that it actually unites the city. The view has to be one of the few in the capital which allows you to see major landmarks from both sides of the river, from Canary Wharf and the Dome in the east, to the London Eye and the Houses of Parliament.

This sense of unity dawned on me as I looked at art by emerging young artists (all under the age of 30) in an exhibition called Bold Tendencies III, curated by Hannah Barry. It is the third such exhibition in the car park, but the first since the success of the Peckham Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, which heralded this suburb's attempt to carve out a place for itself on the contemporary art scene.

The exhibition has some terrific pieces in it, from Hannah Barton and Xavier Poultney's huge black blocks - one with a central hole, and the other containing a fibre optic prism - which face each other and channel the setting sun to create a striking effect.

Another remarkable piece is called Broken Obelisk. James Balmforth's work does exactly what it says on the label, but you have to see it to believe it. And there will be many children who will want to destroy the pristine beauty of Bayly Shelton's piece, Rocks of Ages, Sands of Time.

The setting of a currently-unused car park is genius in itself, particularly as, in this third Bold Tendency, there are a bar and café attached. The unrivalled views alone should prompt people to flock there, but I think it is the art that should get people to the car park in Peckham.

Hannah Barry is a name to watch and I am certain that some of the artists she is championing will be on the verge of fame. If you think there is incongruity in the idea of interesting contemporary art in the place made famous by Del Boy in Only Fools and Horses, then consider the contrast of this: After I left this brilliant view, I wandered the streets of Peckham, and thought about the social conflict of recent years, knife crime and marginalised communities. I marvelled at shop after shop selling fresh meat and fish; vegetables from all over the world, and quick ways of sending money to Africa.

I wanted so much to believe that some of the people I encountered would make the journey up to the top of the car park to share that view and see a united city made real.

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