16 Sunday Sep 2018
Posted in Down by the river, Photography
Viewed from the top of the ramp leading the Thames Path up the relatively new ‘missing link‘ east of Thames Side Studios on the Woolwich-Charlton border, the Thames Barrier and the former Mersey ferry ‘Royal Iris’. The latter, which has featured here before, looks a little sadder each year. I saw a rumour on Twitter that it is likely to be cut up soon, but haven’t been able to confirm it – if you know better, get in touch!
15 Saturday Sep 2018
Posted in Diversions, London, Photography
A walk around the south-western end of Greenwich Peninsula to take some pictures of the under-threat-of-demolition gasholder. There seems to be a growing realisation in the area that this will be missed when it’s gone, but the chances of saving it via the planning process seem slim, unless owners SGN (a gas distribution network) have a change of heart and decide to develop along similar lines to the King’s Cross gasholder.
Eight more photos of the East Greenwich gasholder taken on my walk here.
28 Tuesday Aug 2018
Posted in Diversions, Photography
A walk to the pub on Bank Holiday Sunday evening (because you have to go out on a Bank Holiday Sunday evening, don’t you?), the rain almost stopped after pouring down all afternoon. This shot taken from Charlton Road, looking into the Springfield estate. I’d love the chance to take my camera to the top floor of one of these blocks, with their view across the river and over to Canary Wharf.
26 Sunday Aug 2018
Posted in Diversions, Photography
A Bank Holiday Sunday morning look around Charlton’s Flytipping Quarter* to take some photos, and have a look at the current state of the abandoned and derelict Victoria pub on Woolwich Road. It’s a sorry sight, with much of the back missing. It’s difficult to see now how it could be restored and, if it could, how someone could run a viable pub business on this stretch of the road, unless the new residential developments spring up quickly and are populated by keen pub-goers. Planning objections to proposed new pubs around East Greenwich’s new developments suggest the two may not go hand in hand…
Update: From The Murky Depths blog had a post last year on plans to build accommodation at the back of the pub. It’s not clear if any progress has been made with this plan, though. A cynic would suggest that any developer would benefit from the pub falling apart further before making a new application to demolish it as unsalvageable.
A few more photos of the Victoria pub here.
(*AKA, New Charlton Industrial Estate, shortly to be rebooted as Charlton Riverside – read the latest in the planning saga here)
25 Saturday Aug 2018
Posted in Diversions, Photography
A trip down the A2 to Rochester, to take my Dad – a former history teacher – to see Rochester Castle, the seige (1216) of which he taught generations of schoolchildren in Co. Durham. We also took in the cathedral – pretty vast and somewhat sprawling but also quite beautiful; I particularly liked the floor tiles and Wheel of Fortune. Then a wander along the High Street, with its ‘biggest in England’ secondhand book shop, charity shops, daughter-pleasing sweet shop, and array of Dickens-themed cafes.
20 Monday Aug 2018
Posted in Diversions, London, Photography
Tags
Canary Wharf, East London, Fuji XT20, Fujifilm, Greenwich Park, London skyline, monochrome, National Maritime Museum, Old Royal Naval College, south east London, The Queen's House
A Sunday afternoon walk to Greenwich Park, through the flower garden, past the bandstand to say hello to my uncle playing piano with a Big Band on the bandstand, then on to the Wolfe statue for the classic view over the park looking north.
One day – one day – I’ll pull together some proper then-and-now photos taken from this spot over the last 15 years. But this is how it looks now: the grass in the park very slightly greened up and recovered after weeks without rain; the Isle of Dogs and Canary Wharf stopped at this particular moment of development, a brief pause before the glass and steel buildings spread further out from Canada Square. I’ll no doubt be back there in the coming weeks – maybe I’ll try a then-and-now then.
11 Saturday Aug 2018
Posted in Diversions, Photography
Back in Newcastle for a night after a few very nice days in Edinburgh spent seeing friends and family, and taking in a very small amount of the Fringe. 4pm on a Saturday is not a bad time to leave Edinburgh: the train was quite quiet, and the passengers weren’t really the wrecked specimens you see retreating from the festival later in the month.
I would write a bit about the shows we saw, but they were mainly seen in a social way, and booked by other people. Another year we’ll fully engage in festival planning and pack our days with the full range of offerings. (I’m pretty sure I said that last year, though).
This year’s personal Edinburgh highlight was climbing Arthur’s Seat with my daughter on a perfect blue-skied Thursday morning. Just the right amount of difficulty to feel like a challenge without taking up a whole day, and more than enough to give us both a feeling of achievement.
The sun was shining on Tyneside as we pulled into Central station, lighting up the Tyne Bridge and Sage Gateshead; not the classic view of the bridges from the Quayside or looking east from the King Edward bridge, but distinctively Newcastle. Home, or A Home, anyway. Back to our other home tomorrow, sadly travelling by car rather than train.
The Tyne Bridge shot from the Millennium Bridge last weekend
07 Tuesday Aug 2018
Posted in Diversions, Photography, Politics
Tags
Brexit, County Durham, dawdon colliery, documentary photography, James sebright, John Davies, Newcastle, Nissan Sunderland, Side Gallery
I very much enjoyed a Saturday morning trip to see the Side Gallery’s ‘About the North: Imagined Dialogues’ exhibition, which brings together a range of work from AmberSide’s collection with that of other photographers’ work from across the North.
Amongst the old favourites (I’m always very happy to get up close to John Davies’s big prints – seeing his work in the Deutsche Bourse prize show at The Photographers’ Gallery some years ago remains a key trigger in how I have come to think about photography – and I still get a thrill from seeing Henri Cartier-Bresson’s photos from the North East), there was a good number of pictures I’d not seen before.
I particularly liked Simon Roberts’ Protestors occupy Leeds city council budget meeting, from 2011, which made me wonder how the contemporary photography of the Austerity era will look in 20 years’ time.
The show leans, perhaps unsurprisingly given AmberSide’s roots and location, slightly more to the north east than north west, though there’s representation of Merseyside beyond Martin Parr’s New Brighton photos. This felt refreshing – to me, anyway – in a context where media coverage of the Northern Powerhouse and recent Northern Tail travails have focused so much on Manchester and around.
The images that left the biggest impression were these below, amongst a few others printed large and pasted in the entrance way to the gallery. Until recently the juxtaposition of John Davies’ large format shot of the now long closed Dawdon colliery with James Sebright’s work in Nissan’s Sunderland car plant would have had a fairly simple reading: here is the old work of the north east, with its obvious environmental impact; and here are the new, high-tech jobs. But with politicians from both major parties pursuing a Brexit that would likely take the UK out of the Customs Union, and the likely devastating impact that that would have on all kinds of just-in-time manufacturing businesses, future perception of the second image starts to look somewhat different. What will documentary photos of the north east’s car manufacturing industry represent in 2, 5, or 10+ years’ time?
06 Monday Aug 2018
Posted in Diversions, London, Photography, Uncategorized
Tags
bond bug, Fuji XT20, Fujifilm, Greenwich, intake cars, orange, orange cars of south east London, Park It In The Market
I’ve never been too bothered about photographing vintage cars, bar the odd snapshot, on the (possibly flawed) basis that someone else is bound to be doing it much better, but a little while ago I noticed that there was a collection of photos of orange cars building up on my iPhone camera roll. And once I’d noticed that, I realised that there aren’t many orange cars out there (a shame – some of today’s blander car designs would be improved by an orange paint job), and so I started ‘collecting’ them.
These pics are of two Bond Bugs, caught at the July meet of Park It The Market, the monthly vintage car and bike event that has turned into one of Greenwich’s best (and free) social occasions.
More orange cars of south-east London here.
PS. Got an orange car, live in south-east London, and want some nice photos of your car? Get in touch!
05 Sunday Aug 2018
Posted in Diversions, Photography
Friday evening the week before last, shot from the top deck of the 54 bus shortly after getting soaked in the two minute walk between the station and bus stop. Two hours later the pavements were more or less dry again.
NeilClasper 