The late British abstract artist Robyn Denny is best known for his large-scale works, such as Great Big Biggest Wide London, the giant 1959 mural for menswear company Austin Reed’s Regent Street store.
“Those blue suede shoes had a magical association that seemed authentic. They represented an age of desperate romantic revolt to change your life.”
Malcolm McLaren, notes on his life in fashion, 1997
I’m celebrating the 70th anniversary of the introduction of George Cox & Co’s first creeper at the Port Eliot Festival next week with Adam Waterfield, the fourth generation owner of the great independent British brand, and his son Alistair, a Central Saint Martins student and model who is very much involved in the family business.
Two decades apart, the editors of the American and British editions of Condé Nast’s Vogue began their respective careers with modest contributions to prominent independent youth culture publications of their day.
There were more 150 art schools in this country in the mid-1960s. Most of them are now closed or absorbed into other institutions and the buildings repurposed, remodelled or demolished. What did it mean to have an art school in every town and what can we learn by discovering their fate?
Exhibition notes for The Art Schools Of North West England, 2018
I’m playing catch-up, having been distracted by a big project, but wanted to plug this great exhibition which is on at Liverpool’s prestigious gallery Bluecoat until March next year.
PRINT! Tearing It Up, the exhibition about the resurgence and history of independent progressive British magazines, has entered its final week at central London’s Somerset House.
Continue reading We’re keeping the dialectic open: Final week of PRINT! Tearing It Up at Somerset House
British law firm Charles Russell Speechlys, which supports the exhibitions at Somerset House’s Terrace Rooms, has produced a short film about PRINT! Tearing It Up, the show which I have organised at the gallery with SH senior curator Claire Catterall.
Continue reading ‘The trouble-making and oppositional aspects of this show are what we do so well’: PRINT! Tearing It Up at Somerset House supported by Charles Russell Speechlys
One of the most popular elements of PRINT! Tearing It Up – the celebration of independent magazines currently at Somerset House – is the giant mind map of British publishing which occupies an entire wall in the Terrace Rooms gallery.
Continue reading The PRINT! Mind Map: From A4 rough to 40 sq metre vinyl exhibit
I’m indebted to Tate Liverpool curator Darren Pih for the connection between a photograph which appeared in ARK 33 – the edition of the Royal College Of Art magazine which was the subject of my last post – and a contemporaneous work by the artist Billy Apple.
//Wild youth: Scenes of abandon from Twist Drunk/Drunk Twist in Ark 33. Photos: Keith Branscombe//
The publication of issue 33 of the Royal College of Art’s magazine ARK in the autumn of 1962 hit the moment in terms of the turbo-charging of contemporary youth culture.
Two short films representing the voices of independence in the Somerset House show PRINT! Tearing Up are available online and for visitors to the exhibition.
Continue reading Voices of independence: PRINT! films go live