Phallic Metallics: Erotic jewellery shoot by Hipgnosis for Club magazine 1976
//Jewellery by Gayle Saunders and Stanley Rosenberg. Photography/art direction: Hipgnosis. From Phallic Metallics, Club, May 1976//
I’m grateful to Stian Brekke for sending me a link to his site hipgnosiscovers.com for these arresting pages from a 1976 issue of US men’s magazine Club, launched as the sister publication the British Club International the previous year.
Club’s art director was Club International’s Steve Ridgeway, who told me in a recent interview that he commissioned many of the contributors to the UK title to provide content for the American magazine.
//Jewellery by (clockwise from top left) Jocelyn Davidson, Carrie Linton, Marcia Lloyd, Gayle Saunders. Photography/art direction: Hipgnosis. From Club, May 1976 //
These included the late David Parkinson, who visited Ridgeway in Manhattan in the early spring of 1975 when the first issues of Club were produced. At the time, Parkinson took the opportunity to hook up with his friend Malcolm McLaren, then recovering in New York from the doomed attempt to corral the New York Dolls into reviving their careers. Ridgeway clearly recalls being told by McLaren over drinks in a bar that he was heading back to London to oversee the launch a game-changing group of young musicians.
Showcasing items from the erotic jewellry collection from Fifth Avenue’s enduring antiques and collectibles store Aaron Faber, Phallic Metallics was a three-page feature photographed and art-directed by Hipgnosis, the design studio best known for associations with such giants as Pink Floyd.
//Jewellery from selection at Antiquarius and by H & D Fine. Photography/art direction: David Parkinson. From Fist Impressions, Club International, January 1975//
//Jewellery by Clarissa Cooke, Mike Jackson, Richard Anderson and Booty Jewellry. Photography/art direction: David Parkinson. From Club International, January 1975//
The shoot communicates the studio’s trademark audacity, while the use of the jewellery is in line with some of Parkinson’s work for Club International.
See the shoot at Hipgnosis Covers here.