Oh Bondage! Up Yours! My piece in the latest issue of MacGuffin
//The opening spread of my piece, with images from In The Gutter. Left: Pleasant Gehman, right: Caroline Coon//
//The new issue of MacGuffin//
I’ve returned to the excellent MacGuffin magazine with a piece in their latest issue, which adopts the theme ‘The Chain’.
My text, headed Oh Bondage! Up Yours! quotes the artist and thinker Caroline Coon on female punks’ co-option of chains in the 1970s: ‘The style of the women in punk was a demonstration in visual art about what they were, where they were at and what they believed in. Instead of the fashion industry telling us what to wear we were telling them what to wear.’
//Reproduction of spread from In The Gutter//
//Also from In The Gutter//
There are also insights from jeweller/gallerist Julia Muggenburg. ‘Around the neck or the wrist a chain appears tough yet supple,’ says Muggenburg. ‘With punk the gauge was coarse and large, so that each chain is individual. The sophistication lay in its brutality.’
Some of the images in the piece come from Val Hennessy’s eccentric 1978 punk survey In The Gutter; the section which follows my article features pages direct from Hennessy’s book.
//Opening fold-out spread of MacGuffin No 11//
//Diane Pfammatter’s photography is printed on glossy stock//
Elsewhere the MacGuffin team led by Kirsten Algera and Ernst van der Hoeven pulls out all the stops, from the cover and endpaper fold out to Diana Pfammatter’s extraordinary photography, which is presented on glossy stock.
Buy The Chain issue of MacGuffin here.
Catch up with Caroline Coon here.
Check out Diana Pfammatter’s photography here.
Julia Muggenburg’s shop/gallery is Belmacz.
Copies of In The Gutter are available here.