Over 50 people attended the inaugural awards ceremony of ‘Corbett Portraits’ at Torridon Road Library, Catford, on Thursday 6th November, a photographic competition organised by the Archibald Corbett Society. The photographs feature local residents, their families, shop keepers, street cleaners, the local butcher and other people who live and work on the Corbett Estate.
MP Heidi Alexander handed out prizes in the Over 18 category (won by David Rose with runner-up Sarah Baldock) and the Under 18 category (won by Aidan Hendrickse with runner-up Lola Williams). The winners received digital cameras and will attend a day-long photographic workshop run by local professional photographer Tom Broadbent.
The event was organised by local resident and Archibald Corbett Society member Ben Honeybone, who said “people took some fabulous photographs, and I think were really proud to see their work exhibited in the Library. We hope to run the competition again next year, and build up a ‘living history’ of people on the Estate that future generations will be able to look back on”.
The Society was launched in October 2013 to preserve the legacy of Archibald Cameron Corbett, a philanthropist and social housing reformer who built the Corbett Estate, comprising over 3000 family homes on 287 acres of farm land across Hither Green and South Catford between 1896 and 1913.
The exhibition is currently on view in the foyer of Torridon Road Library and preparations are under way for a further competition in 2015. It is hoped to run a competition annually and build up an album of portraits and pictures of the area to create a permanent record of life on the Corbett Estate though the 21st Century.