There’s a photography exhibition going on at Tate Britain at the moment called ‘Another London’ and I went along to see it the other day. It’s made up of around 40 black and white photos taken between 1930 and 1980 by photographers who were foreigners to London – Henri Cartier-Bresson and Bill Brandt among them.
As the photographers were often commissioned for their work, there’s a lot of ‘touristy’ images of the capital – Hyde Park, Covent Garden, Trafalgar Square – and images of Royal Weddings and Jubilee events, flags waving, Pearly Kings and Queens and fancy dress.
It was especially interesting to me as this week I too have been taking photos in Another London, and coincidentally it’s a London occupied by flag wavers, Pearly Kings and Queens and fancy dress.
The Olympic Park in Stratford is about as un-London as I have ever experienced. Forget grumpy people, rushing about and never saying hello or sorry or thankyou, everyone on the park seems infected with an Olympic glow.
