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Aircraft from the past |
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The picture set this week is about old aircraft. The first manned flight was barely a century ago, yet flying has become almost as commonplace as bus travel, not to mention being seen as the fastest growing cause of global warming. But for all the problems of mass air transport, it's impossible not to like old aeroplanes. Like cars, old planes seem to have so much more character than modern ones. They also make more interesting noises. The pictures come from last month's Shoreham Air Show, as well as the Tangmere Aviation Museum (2003), the Goodwood Revival (2006) and a field in Kent (1988). |
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About this site |
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Images Brighton has 48000 images and you can see the most recently added ones by putting "september2006" in the box on the library search page. New or updated subjects include aircraft and air shows, fruit and vegetables, motorbikes, the Goodwood Revival, Hay-on-Wye and Aberystwyth. To explore the site, go to the information and search guide, plus the indexes of subjects, events & places and Brighton. Have a look at the portfolio and the pictures of the week series. The latter publishes ten images about a particular topic and now has 2300 pictures in total. Then there is the picture sets page which covers specific events and places. Almost all the library's pictures are available for personal or commercial reproduction. Digital files can be delivered by email or CD and prices start from as little as £8. The pages on prices and terms & conditions give further information. Commissioned new photography is also available by arrangement. |
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Last week's pictures featured fruit and veg |
| Last week's pictures were about fruit and vegetables as seen on display at a recent food market in Brighton. Food displays are timeless, but they can also say something about a particular period in time. Take the slogan on the bag in the picture above - "Food you can trust". Ten years ago it might have been seen in a handful of specialist vegetarian shops. Twenty years ago, people would have asked the shopkeeper what he was on about. Likewise the range of produce available today - there can be half a dozen types of garlic on offer when, not so long ago, there might not have been one. Choice, quality and freshness are great, but we shouldn't forget that, even in Britain today, there are millions who still can't afford it. |
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Recent pictures of the week |
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A fortnight ago, the focus was on motorcycle art, which is one of the most striking ways used by bikers to individualise their machines. Petrol tanks are decorated with fantastically detailed and colourful paintings and all manner of ornaments are attached to handlebars, lights and numberplates. The subject matter of most motorbike art is very varied, though certain themes seem especially popular. Death is a favourite and, given the grim accident statistics for bike riding, this is all too understandable. Then there is a definite fondness for Red Indians (Native Americans for the politically correct), fierce animals and, unsurprisingly, attractive young women with their kit off. All the examples of motorcycle art in the feature came from the Ace Cafe rallies on Brighton seafront between 1997 and 2006. This year's Ace Cafe Reunion gathering of bikes and bikers took place on September 10th on Brighton seafront and it was even more spectacular than usual. The sun shone and the whole front was packed with at least 15000 motorcycles and their riders. It was a good opportunity to see a great variety of bikes and also to provide pictures for the subject three weeks ago, which was motorcycle logos. The Ace Cafe rockers are especially fond of Harleys and Triumphs, but there were plenty of other makes on display as well. Unlike the car industry, there still seems to be a healthy number of motorcycle manufacturers. If you would like to see more pictures from earlier years of these annual biker gatherings on Brighton seafront, just follow this link to the ace cafe rallies. For the past eight years, at the beginning of September, tens of thousands of people dress up in vintage clothing and make their way to a green and affluent corner of West Sussex to look at old cars hurtle round a track that ceased to be a competitive racing circuit in 1966. This event, the subject of the picture set four weeks ago, is the Goodwood Revival and it has become one of the most colourful occasions in the contemporary English social calendar. The Revival is the most popular historic motor race meeting in the world and great care is taken to create an authentic period atmosphere. Nothing on the site, so far as can be helped, looks as though it were built after 1966. That certainly applies to the Earl of March, the dashing toff behind the event and who owns the Goodwood course and most of the surrounding countryside. His boyhood dream had been to bring back to life the golden age of British motor racing. This weekend in September, for him and thousands of others, it came true again. |
