Lifting the Curtain
My inspiration for Lifting the Curtain was Charles Booth’s 1889 socio-cultural survey, ‘Life and Labour of the People’. Booth’s view was that ‘East London lay hidden from view behind a curtain on which were painted terrible pictures’. He believed that the mythology overwhelmed the reality. His mission was to lift the curtain and reveal the truth. Lifting the Curtain revisits Booth’s East London through a series of photographs of modern day places juxtaposed with texts drawn from his 1889 survey. The locations pictured are places he would have visited. The texts describe what he witnessed.
Keith Greenough, October 2015
Lifting the Curtain has been exhibited in London and Oxford.  Proceeds from the sale of prints and books have been donated to Toynbee Hall  and Oxford House in East London.