Howard Grey

Various photographs for ‘Omega and After’, a book about the Bloomsbury set, Omega Workshops and Charleston House by Howard Grey and Isabelle Anscombe. Published by Thames and Hudson London.

Portrait of antique dealers, Andy Tilbrook (left) and Dan Klein (right) sitting on the floor.

Portrait of painter and Bloomsbury group member, Duncan Grant.

“Larry was a mate of my Dads. I shot him on the morning he came out of Pentonville prison, because my Dad was in the betting office in the afternoon. Dad was a gambler and most of his friends came from betting offices. This guy, Larry, had enough money to go around the world and note down the bias on all the roulette wheels in the casinos in the world. He’d get people to sit and note down the numbers, and then he’d go around and gamble at the tables for a week and win (the bias would only show after a week). But then he got frustrated with people changing room layouts and getting new wheels and he started getting an inside man to fix the wheel just at closing with a bit of lead or something. And of course he got caught and went to prison.

The day my Dad heard he was getting arrested Larry said to him ‘Look after this case’, like an attache briefcase. My Dad tried for a week to get the combination while the guy was in prison you know, and when he did there were 5 passports, a lot of dollars, and a gun! I said ‘What are you going to do with the money?’ he said ‘I’m going to bloody leave it alone- this guys got friends all over the world!’.

So this photo was taken the morning the guy had gotten out of Pentonville prison before he’d had any food or anything and my Dad said ‘Come round, meet my son and we’ll go out and get a meal, get some decent protien into you’.”

Advert image for Shell point, with Frank Bruno and Harry Carpenter. “He’d just fought Mike Tyson, and I said ‘What was it like?’ and he said ‘It was like coming up against a tractor, he was steel, It was like he’d put his boxing glove through my head- and he was shorter than me!'”

Photographs taken for Howard’s parent’s (Alf and Hetty) bus passes.