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Some years ago I went to that famous exhibition at Tate Modern, when they filled up the turbine hall with ceramic sunflower seeds.

By that time I got there – a few days into the show – health & safety had declared that the public were not allowed to walk, roll and sit on them.

From behind the barriers, the show was decidedly underwhelming. It had scale, but not a great deal of substance. I thought the whole thing was Ai We We robbery.

Rather more instructive – and packed with carbohydrates – was the recent exhibition of piles of rice on the top floor of Snow Hill 2.

In case you haven’t noticed, two huge and identical office-blocks have arisen at the town end of Snow Hill, to occupy the space that has been “about to be developed” for almost 40 years. It was to be a bus station, a swimming pool, a sports complex and other ambitious schemes I can’t remember. Now it’s offices.

What has been refreshing about Birmingham’s “stop-start” redevelopment over recent years is that buildings, temporarily unoccupied, have been commandeered by artists.

The old Municipal Bank in Broad Street was recently given over to an art show entitled “Thrift Radiates Happiness”, and at least offered an opportunity to revisit a building that’s been closed so long I couldn’t remember it.

Ideally, when you make space available like this, you give the artists time and room to explore the meaning of the building, and that was certainly true of Thrift, a sombre reflection on the recession, banks and saving.