Drop it

But wait until the bus has passed.

(Seen in Oxford Street, London, this afternoon.)

I visited the Photographer's Gallery to see, among other exhibitions, a display of photographs by Roger Mayne of London's Southam Street taken in the 1950s and early 1960s. Like many examples of street photography, the images are not necessarily superbly composed or competition winners, but they capture superbly the lifestyles of the time.  The clothing and activities recorded here accurately reflect that period of British history.

While looking at the photographs, I became aware of a very familiar noise coming from another room, but strangely amplified.  It was the sound of Carousel slide projectors regularly changing slides, but it turned out to be five projectors, all changing at slightly different times, together with the occasional click and bang as a slide got caught in the mechanism and only reluctantly slid into the gate.     This was an installation called "The British at Leisure", 310 images projected on to five screens continuously throughout the opening times of the gallery, with the typical, slightly faded or desaturated colours of old slide film.  Given the tendency of even the best quality projectors to jam occasionally (and it did sound as if these were trying) it seemed to me to be a very brave decision to leave this installation running all day.