David Gray's pictures of the week 28-4-2008

DAVID GRAY photography
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This week's picture feature comes from a recent visit to Portsmouth. Since my last trip there in 2002, the city has seen big changes - the Spinnaker Tower, new apartment buildings, shops and "leisure facilities", not to mention its football team in the Premier League and this year's Cup Final. But for all the glossy new buildings, Pompey still feels, at least to an outside observer, an essentially unloveable, even unhappy place. The new shops are identikit chainstores and most of the new apartments won't sell in the recession. Local wages are low, lots of pubs are closing and there are too many angry drunks and violent-looking young men on the streets. Other places are the same, of course, but it's particularly depressing in Portsmouth because it has such a splendid history. Its parks and promenades are full of cannons and monuments to foreign conquests and the defence of the realm. Despite wartime bombing and post-war "redevelopment", it is still full of fine buildings. But like so many other English cities, Pompey's glorious and confident past cannot make up for its grotty and insecure present. And sadly so.

HMS Victory and HMS Invincible in the Naval Dockyard (image 2756-133)

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