Colin O’Brien’s journey of photography began in 1948 when he took a picture of his two Italian friends with his family’s old brownie box camera in Clerkenwell.
The Clerkenwell O’Brien was born into in 1940 is now a long distant memory, compared to today’s loft apartments and designer shops along Clerkenwell Road.
This is what makes O’Brien’s images of day to day life in the 50s and 60s – children playing, lovers taking a stroll and even car crashes so significant. The commonplace is so often overlooked, but these photographs are the most important documentation of a way of life that has long since ceased to exist.
