East End Review

Tag: David Bailey

  • High achievers with dyslexia share their stories in new book

    Margaret Rooke with Benjamin Zephaniah
    Author Margaret Rooke with Benjamin Zephaniah

    When photographer David Bailey and his art critic friend each decided to take a photograph of the same view in Cornwall, there’s no surprise whose turned out the best.
    “I achieve this without being able to explain why,” says Bailey, before acknowledging that his mind must work in a way that makes him see things differently from other people.

    Bailey is one of 23 contributors to the book Creative, Successful, Dyslexic by Stoke Newington author Margaret Rooke, in which well known figures from the arts, sport and business worlds describe their experiences of dyslexia.

    Dyslexic celebrities such as Richard Branson, Eddie Izzard and Darcey Bussell reveal the difficulties they faced in childhood, and how, ultimately, they think dyslexia actually helped them reach the top of their professions.

    For Bailey, who only became aware of the word ‘dyslexia’ when he was 30, curiosity and spark, and not the ability to spell, are the main factors for a successful life. He talks about his “uncommon sense” and how making mistakes can be the basis for a lot of art.

    Margaret Rooke had the idea for the book after her own daughter was diagnosed with dyslexia, aged 13.

    “It was just such a shock to us, and it took a long time for it to sink in,” Rooke says. “But I really did want her to know that she could still do what she wanted in life. I didn’t want this to be something that weighed heavily on her shoulders.”

    Rooke quotes the story of a friend whose son was diagnosed with dyslexia. When the friend spotted an article about how Richard Branson was dyslexic, she cut it out and stuck it to the son’s bed, and it turned out to be a turning point for the son.

    “I thought it’d be great to get a whole book together with lots of different examples,” Rooke says.

    With the help of charity Dyslexia Action, who put forward some of their ambassadors, Rooke was able to put the book together. One thing common to all of the stories is the importance of a positive outlook.

    “When we found out that my daughter was dyslexic I didn’t have a positive response,” Rooke admits.

    “But the attitude from the experts in the book and a lot of the people I interviewed was to be positive. The attributes that come with dyslexia might not help with school qualifications but they can still help your child in the world of work.”

    Rooke recognises that teachers do an “incredible job” and that schools are much more “on it” when it comes to dyslexia these days. But when the educational establishment places attainment and results above everything else, including creativity, how can those who learn in different ways thrive?

    “I’ve found just in the playground there’s a lot of competitiveness and kids always know who is top of the class,” says Rooke. “Even if we’re not in an age where teachers call out the results, kids do know and I would say step away from all of that because there are other ways to shine.”

    Poet Benjamin Zephaniah, who holds 17 honorary doctorate degrees yet still finds the word ‘knot’ difficult to spell, ends the collection with a powerful call to arms.

    “If someone can’t understand dyslexia it’s their problem, not yours,” he tells the reader directly. “In the same way, if someone oppresses me because of my race I don’t sit
    down and think ‘How can I become white?’

    “It’s not my problem, it’s theirs and they have to come to terms with it. So if you’re dyslexic, don’t be heavy on yourself.”

    Creative, Successful, Dyslexic: 23 High Achievers Share Their Stories is published by Jessica Kingsley. RRP: £16.99. ISBN: 9781849056533

  • David Bailey: For Real review – ‘A palimpsest of post-war London life’

    David Bailey 620
    Photograph by David Bailey courtesy of Daniel Blau Munich/London

    You can take David Bailey out of the East End, but you can’t take the East End out of David Bailey: in this new exhibition, even his portraits of elder Delhi men evoke the moustachioed hipsters of Kingsland Road.

    Bailey: For Real at Daniel Blau London, one of three Bailey shows held internationally by the gallery in 2014, focuses on the more gritty, yet intimate aspects of his oeuvre: more like a carpenter’s sawdust than his recent glamorous National Portrait Gallery retrospective Stardust. “The East End personifies London for me –  or, it did –  because it was where I was brought up,” he once told the BBC. “I like change; I like the way it morphs into something else.”

    Best known for his 1960s fashion photography, Bailey was born in Leytonstone in January 1938, into a rag-tag trade: the son of a tailor. His mother was born in Bow, his father in Hackney, his grandfather in Bethnal Green, and his genealogy from there –  as far as records go –  traces to Whitechapel. So, although his blossoming career took him around the globe, Bailey made frequent trips back to the East End.

    The prints on show are certainly not an exclusive coup: Mick Jagger and his chiselled cheekbones make an appearance, alongside several portraits of Bailey’s famous friends, but we’ve seen it all before, and quite recently. What the exhibition does offer is a morphed, oblique perspective both on individual images, and the photographer’s work as a whole. Everything on show is presented on torn, imperfect pieces of glossy fibre photographic paper: each is uniquely frayed and shredded by Bailey’s own hands. It renders not only the tactile process of image-making more personal, but also cuts much of the familiar images we know: zooming in closely, it increases the proximity to and intensity of the subjects.

    Bethnal Green (1961) depicts a young boy almost buckling under the weight of a crate of Charrington beer from the local brewery. East End (1961) is a complex shot of a pub window; an attractive barmaid pulls a pint, while lines of acid-etched words in the window contrast with an advertising hoarding message in the reflection. One image portrays a tattoo of the Kray twins – the notorious East London gangsters that befriended Bailey –  itself based on an iconic portrait he once took of them. The exhibition also shows a bleak side of the capital’s east here. Children explore amongst masses of sacks strewn chaotically in one photograph, while another shows a dilapidated, ramshackle building on Viaduct Street, just a stone’s throw away from where Bethnal Green tube now is. Bailey himself was blown out of his home by the Luftwaffe.

    These grainy rolls of aged black-and-white celluloid are reminiscent of George Brassai’s candid street photography in Paris. They are very much like relics, shown here in mounted boxes rather than frames, and are a palimpsest of post-war London life, as well as a few ventures abroad. However, while they do provide an interesting angle on Bailey’s work, the exhibition –  in a year that has comprehensively surveyed the photographer –  is relatively lightweight.

    Bailey: For Real is at Daniel Blau Gallery, 51 Hoxton Square, N1 6PB until 28 June.