Paul Gorman

Photography

Photography: Soho Pam by Carla Borel

Regulars on both sides of various Soho bars having been mourning the familiar figure the vast majority of us knew simply as Pam.

This portrait by photographer Carla Borel captures Pam’s charm, sweetness and light. And she’s in her element, outside The French.

Alastair Choat, landlord of The Coach & Horses, is hosting the wake for Pam after the funeral next Wednesday (January 30) from 3pm.

Read the obituary of Soho Pam here; at the time of writing this had been shared online more than 1,000 times within less than 24 hours of posting.

View Borel’s exemplary portfolio here.

At Johnny Rotten’s pad in Malcolm McLaren’s leather jeans 1978: The story behind the photograph

This just in from Joe Stevens, following yesterday’s post about his new website: the story behind the photo with Johnny Rotten above, taken in London in 1978.

We were at his Gunter Grove digs in Fulham. Malcolm (McLaren) had left his grotty leathers in my flat in NYC during the Sid and Nancy murder doings. I had them dry cleaned. Never got the $90 for that one.
He had Glitterbest problems in London. So did Rotten. I was over there to do pictures of Public Image Limited.
He made a nice curry. I crashed there with him and Nora (Forster). Ari (Up, Forster’s daughter) would pop by often.
We watched her and The Slits record Heard It Thru The Grapevine and Chrissie (Hynde) rehearsing with her new Pretenders.
Yeah, he’s holding up his trousers with a strand of white cord.
I was later a witness at the High Court trial involving the band versus Glitterbest.
I tried on Malcolm’s leather trousers. Fell in love. It was a first. Went to London in them. Never took them off. Returned two weeks later to NYC wearing them.
Had them cleaned again. This time they didn’t survive. All I got back was swatches of leather in a bag.

Stevens’ new website is here.

Herb Schmitz’s lost London demi-monde: City Lights Studio, Yvonne Gold, Katharine Hamnett, Ika Hindley, David “Piggy” Worth, Jay Johnson, Barbara Trentham, Marrion Womble et al

//Marrion Womble + Barbara Trentham in City Lights Studio clothes, London, 1973.//

Herb Schmitz proudly describes himself as a photojournalist.

From the start of his career in London in the late 60s, the Dusseldorf-born Schmitz has turned an unerring eye to all manner of subject matter: seascapes,Turkish gangsters, the WW2 head of the Polish government in exile, the social scene in latterday Shoreditch (where he has operated a studio for more than 25 years)…

//Ika Hindley models Hamnett bangles, 1973.//

In the wake of a recent exhibition at Amsterdam’s Unseen Photo Fair, Schmitz has opened his archive of early 70s fashion photography for me, revealing images of a lost London demi-monde clad by such hallowed enterprises as City Lights Studio (the Covent Garden boutique operated by the subject of my latest book, Tommy Roberts) and Katherine Hamnett’s label Tuttabankem.

Continue reading Herb Schmitz’s lost London demi-monde: City Lights Studio, Yvonne Gold, Katharine Hamnett, Ika Hindley, David “Piggy” Worth, Jay Johnson, Barbara Trentham, Marrion Womble et al

Photography: Baron Wolman + The Groupies

//Trixie Merkin, 1968. Photo: Baron Wolman.//

My appreciation for the visual culture surrounding popular music was given a leg-up at an early age by a Christmas 1973 gift: Rolling Stone‘s photography compendium Shooting Stars.

Edited by Annie Leibovitz, Shooting Stars lined up a number of the magazine’s photographic contributors who had recorded the American rock music scene in its pomp.

//Front cover, Shooting Stars, Straight Arrow Books, 1973.//

Continue reading Photography: Baron Wolman + The Groupies

Glam comes into focus: Karl Stoecker’s fashion shoot for Club International October 1972


Tucked away at the back of an issue of British soft-porn magazine Club International was a fashion shoot featuring clothing elements which denoted the crystallisation of the new art-directed glam aesthetic inaugurated by the release of Roxy Music’s first album a couple of months previously.

The photographer was Karl Stoecker, the New Yorker who had been resident in the UK since the mid-60s and was coming into his own with important contributions to Roxy’s visual identity across that LP and its successors For Your Pleasure and Stranded.

Continue reading Glam comes into focus: Karl Stoecker’s fashion shoot for Club International October 1972

Television: ARTE’s London Calling

Continental Europe appears to have gone bananas for British popular culture this Jubilympics* summer, hence Franco-German arts channel ARTE’s new four-part series London Calling.

The programme was made by seasoned documentarist Simon Witter and looks to be a treat (particularly the intelligent use of archive material; great to see rare footage of John Stephen striding along Carnaby Street).

Continue reading Television: ARTE’s London Calling

Identified! The ‘strange boy in drag’ at Pierre Laroche’s breakfast with Ossie Clark, Marianne Faithfull + Michael Roberts in 1974

//According to artist Kevin Whitney, the "strange boy in drag" was the German fashion model Jurgen (surname not known).//

A couple of months back I wrote about a photo-session conducted at David Hockney’s Notting Hill house* in May 1974 by photographer Willie Christie.

Continue reading Identified! The ‘strange boy in drag’ at Pierre Laroche’s breakfast with Ossie Clark, Marianne Faithfull + Michael Roberts in 1974