'Sunny Southend Closed for Business' - an electronic road sign advising visitors to stay at home during the Covid-19 lockdown
- Date:
- 11 Apr 2020
- Location:
- Southend-on-Sea
- Reference:
- HEC01/036/01/097
- Type:
- Photograph (Digital)
The Picturing Lockdown Collection was created during April and May 2020, in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. During seven days the public were asked to submit photographs that they felt best represented their experiences of lockdown in England, and from these submissions one hundred representing all the different geographic regions were chosen to be archived with Historic England. Alongside these images, ten artists were commissioned to produce their own images over the course of five days, representing their lockdown experience. These were supplemented with images by Historic England’s own photographers. Together, the Picturing Lockdown collection forms a permanent visual record of this unusual time in history.
This photograph is one of the one hundred images taken by the public, and was chosen to represent the East of England region. It was taken at 16.30 on 11th April 2020. The photographer wrote the following text to explain how the image documents their experience of lockdown: "I live in a tourist town, so to see the roads empty and crowds gone on a Saturday afternoon is both scary and surreal. It epitomizes the phrase ghost-town."
This is part of the Sub Series: HEC01/036/01 Picturing Lockdown Collection - Public Submissions; within the Series: HEC01/036 Picturing Lockdown Collection; within the Collection: HEC01 Historic England
© Terry Withers
Photographer: Withers, Terry
Health And Welfare, Road Transport
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