News

Unseen 1960s Photos of London’s East End

A hidden archive of glorious Kodachrome, rediscovered.

We don’t know a whole lot about the life of the amateur photographer David Granick.

We know he was born in Stepney, an area of London’s East End, in 1912, as the eldest child of Anne Rabinovitch and Jonah Granick. Sometime when he was in his 50s, we think, he started to photograph the broader neighborhood where he’d grown up. He must have been a pretty precise person: each image included a date and an exact location. And we know that before he died, in 1980, he arranged to have his slides donated to Tower Hamlets Local History Library & Archives.

Beyond these basic details, though, there is precious little information available about Granick. Even his work—consisting of more than 3,000 Kodachrome transparencies—remained largely unseen for over three decades. That didn’t start to change until early 2017, when the East London photographer Chris Dorley-Brown first glimpsed Granick’s work at the Archives.

 

“I was completely blown away by these pictures,” says Dorley-Brown, of the first time he saw Granick’s slides. “I had always suspected that there was a great color collection of East London photographs taken during this era.”

Spitalfields Market, 1973.

Dorley-Brown had long been fascinated with the post-war East End, and particularly its depiction in color film. “Granick was an amateur,” he says. “He shot these pictures to illustrate talks he gave to local history groups, and I think that is what makes them so alluring. There is no ‘professional’ agenda here. They are impressionistic, personal. He knew the territory and how to photograph it from an insider’s perspective.”

This territory—which has no official boundary but lies, broadly, east of the City of London and north of the Thames —experienced brutal bombings during World War II, particularly the docklands. Some of this damage is visible in Granick’s photographs, 20 years after the war had ended. “The East End was changing rapidly during these decades,” says Dorley-Brown. “The area was very run down. My feeling is that Granick wanted to preserve this melancholic post-war mood, so it’s really the last glimpse of a lost paradise. I can imagine that this was his motivation.”

This mood is conveyed by both the tones of the Kodachrome film Granick used, as well as his stylistic choices. “The lighting and compositions are very precise,” says Dorley-Brown. “There is such care in the decisions he made, what to include, what to exclude. London is quite chaotic visually, not an easy place to photograph well.”

Belhaven Street, 1977.

Nearly all of Granick’s work was shot on Kodachrome 64, a type of color film that has now been discontinued. “The rarity of archival color pictures is what makes these so unique,” says Dorley-Brown. “Thank God he shot on Kodachrome, it’s so stable that they are as good as the day they were shot and it digitizes very well.”

In one photo, a derelict house stands under the then brand-new, 17-story Stifford Estates in Stepney Green. In another, an elderly woman in a pink cardigan pauses in her doorway; the house next door has been demolished, but its floral wallpaper is still visible on the side of her house. Another shows a man pulling a horse and cart along Three Colt Street, pointing at the camera. Behind him is the steeple of a 17th-century church, St Anne’s, and a crane.

“The emergence of these pictures is very timely,” notes Dorley-Brown. “The speed of development in East London [today] is out of control. Locals are being priced out of the area. These images remind us what could be lost.”

Stifford Estate, Stepney Green, 1961.

The publication this month of a book based on Granick’s work, The East End in Color 1960-1980, coincides with an exhibition of some of the photographs at the Archives’ building on Bancroft Road—the very same building where Granick’s slides were originally donated in 1980. Dorley-Brown wrote the introduction to the book, and in it, he sees the world Granick captured on the cusp of change:

“…the photographer knows he’s getting the last shots of those wharves, steamers and warehouses before they are replaced by imagined hotels and marinas, the proto-blueprint for the new world dominated by leisure, tourism and heritage replicas. These post-dockland utopias are soon to be upgraded into big business steel and glass, craven monuments of late capitalism. The future was in a distant haze, just around the corner.”

Atlas Obscura has a selection of images from the book, published by Hoxton Mini Press; the exhibition is open through May 5, 2018.

Mile End Road, 1977. DAVID GRANICK/ TOWER HAMLETS LOCAL HISTORY LIBRARY & ARCHIVESThree Colt Street, 1975.Watney Market, 1974.Gardiner’s Corner, 1963.The East End in Color 1960-1980. COURTESY HOXTON MINI PRESS

Related Posts

Queen Camilla has been forced to cancel her forthcoming public engagements after being laid low by a nasty chest infection.

Queen Camilla has been forced to cancel her forthcoming public engagements after being laid low by a nasty chest infection. The 77-year-old royal is understood to be recovering at home in Wiltshire and is being monitored by doctors. It means that Her Majesty has had to reluctantly withdraw from the annual opening of the Field of Remembrance at Westminster Abbey this Thursday.

Kamala Harris officially conceded the election to Donald Trump in a speech to her devastated fans in Washington D.C. – after President Joe Biden called his new successor to congratulate him.

Kamala Harris officially conceded the election to Donald Trump in a speech to her devastated fans in Washington D.C. – after President Joe Biden called his new successor to congratulate him. Harris thanked her supporters and said her ‘heart is full of trust and love of our country’ and said she’s ‘so proud’ of the race she ran. ‘The outcome of this election is not want we wanted, not what we fought for, not what we voted for,’ she said, adding that America’s light won’t go out as long as ‘we never give up and we keep fighting.’

Workouts first thing in the morning or last thing at night could be most effective for staving off cancer, research suggests.

Workouts first thing in the morning or last thing at night could be most effective for staving off cancer, research suggests. Those who were more active at the start or end of the day had the lowest chances of developing bowel cancer, a study found. Experts say the findings suggest there are peak times for physical activity which could be used to design targeted cancer prevention strategies.

The light in Wolfy’s eyes went out and his warmth, softness and presence receded into the landscape of my memory. I would never kiss his fur again, feel his warmth, or his reassuring presence leaning firmly against my knee.

The light in Wolfy’s eyes went out and his warmth, softness and presence receded into the landscape of my memory. I would never kiss his fur again, feel his warmth, or his reassuring presence leaning firmly against my knee. My dearest companion was gone. I bent double and let out a long and primal scream. Someone handed me a glass. Our neighbourhood’s much-loved vet, Andrew Carmichael, was there holding a stiff whisky and also wiping away tears. Now in his 80s, Andrew has euthanised countless animals, yet…’This job gets harder, not easier,’ he said. ‘Here’s to dear Wolfy and to the others that follow. You will love many more dogs in your life.’

On the surface of it, Labour’s decision to break another promise and put up university tuition fees feels like a smack in the chops for educational aspiration: just like the mean-spirited, ideological and poorly thought-out decision to charge VAT on private school fees.

On the surface of it, Labour’s decision to break another promise and put up university tuition fees feels like a smack in the chops for educational aspiration: just like the mean-spirited, ideological and poorly thought-out decision to charge VAT on private school fees. In Opposition, this government – and in particular Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner – made grandiose pledges about ‘free education for all throughout your life’, no doubt mindful of appealing to voters aged 18-24 who, bless ’em, still fall for this socialist claptrap. To be rowing back so quickly on that vow is an embarrassment, even a betrayal. It doesn’t really matter that the fee increase, at least for the first year, is relatively modest at £285, up from £9,250.

A hair stylist who alleges she was raped by Conor McGregor and his friend feared the mixed martial arts star was going to kill her during the ordeal, the High Court was told yesterday.

A hair stylist who alleges she was raped by Conor McGregor and his friend feared the mixed martial arts star was going to kill her during the ordeal, the High Court was told yesterday. Nikita Hand, 35, has alleged that Mr McGregor and his friend James Lawrence, of Rafters Road, Drimnagh, both had sex with her twice without her consent in a Dublin hotel penthouse, following a cocaine-fuelled party. She claims she was left extensively bruised and scratched following the assault, during which she claimed Mr McGregor held her in a ‘stranglehold’.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *