Photographer Ian Beesley Exhibits 1970s70s-80s Bradford Street Life

A new exhibition at Salts Mills in Saltaire features a selection of black-and-white photos taken by social documentary photographer Ian Beesley, capturing street corner life in Bradford during the 1970s and 80s. Beesley, who has spent five decades documenting northern England, highlights these street corners as vital social hubs where people gathered around bus stops, telephone boxes, and posters, engaging in various activities like playing marbles and expressing themselves through graffiti. Despite plans to retire, Beesley continues to curate unseen images from his extensive 200,000-photo archive, with upcoming exhibits including a Halloween-themed collection. These images offer a vivid glimpse into the social dynamics and youth culture of the era, paralleling other retrospectives on teenage life in the 1970s that emphasize slower-paced, more tactile experiences compared to today's digital immediacy. The visual documentation underscores the importance of community spaces in past decades, contrasting with the constant connectivity and rapid cultural shifts experienced by today's teenagers. Together, these exhibitions provide a rich historical perspective on youth and public life in the late 20th century.