The working life of Museum of London

Time is ticking away before the 20 images that will make up the Your 2012 free photography exhibition go on display dealing with the impact of the construction of the Olympic Park in Stratford, East London. Come along and see it when it starts at the Museum of London Docklands on the 22nd of July 2011.

It looks set to be a very exciting exhibition on a topic that is interesting for many people. Public and media interest is growing exponentially at the moment for the Olympics. Look at this post taken by the Viewtube during high Summer last year and compare it with the pictures taken earlier this month below at the same site.

Not only are large numbers of schools attending the site but also various senior citizens and tourist groups.

Even the media itself are regularly checking up on progress and reporting it nationwide.

If you would like to learn more about the Olympic site than I recommend that you come along to one of the our Olympic tours called ‘Walk the Olympic Way’ that we will be offering on Sunday 12th June 2011 from 2.30pm -4pm and Wednesday July 27th from 2.30pm – 4pm.

Come again next week and we will look at the progress taking place at the Crossrail site that is right in front of the Olympic Stadium.

Peter

Time is ticking away before the 20 images that will make up the Your 2012 free exhibition go on display dealing with the impact of the construction of the Olympic Park in Stratford, east London. Come along and see it when it starts at the Museum of London Docklands on 22nd  July 2011.

In the meantime to whet your appetite here is a picture of one of the canal boats that have been doing such a great job in clearing up the canals in preparation for the Olympics next year.

In case you are wondering just what they have to clear away check out the photo below.

If you would like to learn more about the Olympics site than I recommend that you come along to one of our Olympic tours  called ‘Walk the Olympic Way’ that we will be doing on Sunday 12th June 2011 from 2.30pm -4pm and Wednesday July 27th from 2.30pm – 4pm.

Don’t forget to check this blog next week when I will be talking about the increasing media interest in the constructions sites in and around the Olympic Park.

Peter

Today our final Big Issue vendor, Richard, shares a selection of the images he has taken capturing life on the streets of London as part of a joint project between the Museum of London and The Big Issue around our current London Street Photography exhibition.

Richard’s photographs now join those taken by Viv, Hazel and Mahesh with a number of images from across this project appearing in a forthcoming edition of The Big Issue. Images will then be selected to be displayed in the London Street Photography exhibition which continues until 3 September at the Museum of London.

The following five images from Richard highlight unguarded snapshots of moments that are in turn curious, busy, unusual, relaxed and, finally, tender.

“Curiosity”

“Rush hour on the bridge”

“Sound Man”

“Lovely day for a walk”

[no caption]

Time is ticking away before the 20 images that will make up the Your 2012 free exhibition go on display dealing with the impact of the construction of the Olympic Park in Stratford, East London. Come along and see it when it starts at the Museum of London Docklands in July.

As you can see much of the work has now been completed on the Olympics stadium. Work is now moving on to the surrounding area where the red Mittel Orbit Tower and the adjoining 2012 Olympic Garden will be built.

                If you are curious as to what it looked like a whole year ago then check out below.

And if you enjoyed these pictures then please remember to look at this blog again and you will see how the Aquatic Centre has been changing over the last year in my next update.

 Peter

As we work towards finalising the 20 images that will make up  Your 2012,  our free display on the impact of the construction of the Olympic Park in Stratford, East London, opening at the Museum of London Docklands in July.

We quickly wanted to share with you this picture and thought:

Might we be in for a warm Spring and a hot Summer? Lets hope so. The notice below seems to be a good sign of things to come.

Today we bring you images taken by The Big Issue vendor Viv, who has over the last two weeks, as part of a project in conjunction with The Big Issue, been capturing life on London’s streets.  A selection of work  on this ongoing project will eventually be displayed in our London Street Photography exhibition.

This picture was taken at Embankment and Viv has added the following extract from her diary regarding help provided to the homeless in this area of London: “…one of the biggest soup runs in London [is located nearby] and they come out once a week and it’s run by the same family for the last 20 years or more.  The street people call it The Stew. 50 – 200 people come to get fed”.

This image is from East Street Market where,Viv comments in her diary: “Charlie Chaplin used to go there as he lived nearby”.

Viv’s travels took her to many different parts of London as captured in the photographs below:

Viv wanted to capture ” a variety of street life”  and ”really enjoyed the project and would have liked to have done it for longer!”

You can catch up on previous blog updates here from both Hazel and Mahesh.

Today we bring you Hazel’s final update following on from her first posting last week of photographs she is taking as part of a project in conjunction with The Big Issue to capture Big Issue vendors own unique view of London’s streets to form part of our exhibition London Street Photography which opens on Friday.

Having been briefed to capture life as its happens on the street and avoid posed pictures, Hazel has contributed the following ’street photographs’ for possible inclusion in the exhibition. This project finishes at the end of March after our fifth volunteer has submitted their images. It is planned that the chosen images from this project will be included in the exhibition from June.

Hazel’s final image featured on our blog sees an Evening Standard newspaper distributor reflectively lighting up a dark London evening and is accompanied by the following extract from Hazel’s diary:

“The Evening Standard has been part of London street life for 170 years. As commuters pass through one of London’s busiest stations,Waterloo, they pass hard and fast day in day out”…

Look out for our third volunteer Big Issue vendor’s images and thoughts in the coming weeks.

Beliz Tecirli, Assistant Contract Manager at Museum of London Archaeology, talks about the recent site visits for schools and local residents which she helped to organise at Crossrail’s Stepney Green site.

Museum of London Archaeology (MOLA), together with Crossrail, hosted a series of site visits for schools and other local residents to view the important archaeological work taking place at our Stepney Green site before construction begins to build a ventilation shaft for the Crossrail tunnels. The aim of these visits was to engage the local community in the history of their local area and to promote the archaeology and the modern development (by Crossrail) currently taking place.

The school visits, which ran between 25th and 28th January, welcomed pupils from six nearby schools. Pupils enjoyed a ‘dig box’ activity with our archaeologists Heather Knight, Sam Pfizenmaier, Tom Hoyle and Victoria Stanfield, where they dug the remains of Roman and medieval structures and worked out what they had found and how to record it. The digging was followed by a site tour led by David Sankey, Senior Archaeologist responsible for the site investigations.

The children were kitted up in Personal Protective Equipment just like archaeologists, and toured the site with Dave, who showed them what the archaeologists had found so far, and explained the significance of Stepney Green in the larger national history. The tour included the remains of a courtyard house built in the late 1400s or early 1500s. Amongst them are the foundations of King John’s Tower, a defended gatehouse of a type built during the Wars of the Roses, which remained standing on site until the 19th century (lending its name to King John Street).

Parliament confiscated the house from the Catholic 1st Marquess of Worcester because he funded Charles I during the Civil War. At least parts of it were occupied by Nonconformist Protestant ministers in the later 17th century, and the remains of a Congregational Church (still standing) descend from their meeting house. By degrees, the main house was converted to a Baptist College, and parts of the college’s chapel still stand.

On the Saturday following the school visits, the site tours were enjoyed by members of the public. St Dunstan’s Church, located close to the site, kindly offered their hall space for an exhibition of finds from the site. Our archaeologist, Victoria, greeted visitors dressed in 17th-century costume, and was there along with other MOLA staff – Elaine Eastbury, Mike Tetreau and Amy Chambers – to answer questions regarding the history of the objects on display.

Public participation is very important for us at MOLA, and opportunities like this give us the chance to share our findings with local communities. Our site visits received great reviews in the Metro, on ITV London and in the East London Advertiser.

- Beliz Tecirli, event organiser

This weeks post is from Hazel, the second of our The Big Issue vendors, who have voluntered to take pictures representing their view of London streets according to their understanding of the ’street photography’ criteria of un-posed, spontaneous moments.

Here Hazel explains her initial thoughts on the project: “when I was told about this project and then given this camera, I thought, no, I have too much clutter in my mind to define what I see and what I want to say. But then what the heck I opened the shutter and these are some of the pictures I took”.

Hazel also provided the captions that accompany these two images.

“Street People”

Hazel has recently given a talk to a group of teenagers and volunteers, they asked her about ‘begging’ and Helen told them: “I don’t use that word because the name you give someone affects how you see them. The ones you call Beggars I call Cup People and the homeless, I call Street People“.

“This is Vauxhall/Oval where a lot of the people have been re-housed. A lot of the people are very poor. You can’t take pictures of children but this is where the children play”

Although not strictly meeting the exact ’street photography’ criteria, the strength of Hazel’s caption for the above image ensured its inclusion in this post and highlights the personal nature of this project.

Hazel admits to initially having problems fitting in taking photographs and selling copies of the magazine as this diary extract from the first two days of February highlights: “…still having trouble working the camera. I’ll sell a few issues and get back to it…next day, I’m clicking away. I hope the camera has accepted them cos I can’t find them”.

 Images from this project will feature in our our upcoming London Street Photography exhibition at the Museum of London.

Catch up on Mahesh’s first blog for this project here.

As part of our London Street Photography exhibition opening in February we are working with The Big Issue on a project to capture London streets from a different perspective.

As a magazine and movement that was born and lives on the streets, The Big Issue has a unique take on life in the capital.

With this in mind, a number of vendors around London have volunteered to take pictures over a two week period representing their view of London’s streets according to the ’street photography’ criteria of un-posed, spontaneous moments that can sometimes provide a brief encounter or momentary juxtaposition.

Vendors will also keep a diary of their experiences and we will share both this and their images here and in upcoming editions of  The Big Issue before selecting one image to form part of the exhibition.

Our first vendor to participate, Mahesh, would like to dedicate his diary and pictures to “the people of this great city, both past and present, who have in the past and continue to make this city vibrant”.

Mahesh’s images from Kensington High Street show an ever-evolving city by capturing construction works in progress:

“Construction workers busily arranging to off-load huge girders and reinforced steel rods on this busy London street”.

 ”More material being unloaded. Reminds me of the disciplined Leaf Cutter Ant’s activities. Excellent deployment of resources”.

“Major construction work in the centre of the West End of London so cleanly, clinically undertaken. Impressive. Sad reminder of the apparent lack of reasonable constructive activity in post-earthquake Haiti”.

Mahesh leaves us with this striking picture which he introduces so eloquently…”an elegant senior citizen relaxing with a hurried smoked cigarette. It is cold.