Poster For Blondie’s 12-Inch singles ‘Denis’, ‘Contact in Red Square’ and ‘Kung Fu Girls’, February 1978, 42.5 x 30.4 cm, 16¾ x 12 in. Courtesy of The Mott Collection
Poster for The Slits’ album ‘Cut’, September 1979, 50.8 x 75.5 cm, 20 x 29¾ in. Courtesy of The Mott Collection
Forty years ago, a revolution took shape and stormed the shores of the U.K. Punk had arrived—and it could not, would not, refused to be denied. It took everything the nation held dear and turned it upside down, then dropped it on its head, with the aim to break it open and find freedom. Gone were the polite niceties, the veneer the nation upheld while the empire crumbled. Punks knew there was nothing nice—or civilized—about it all. No pretense could cloak the truth about the subjugation of the world.
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As the U.K. struggled to rebuild, a new generation came forth calling out the fraud, the perpetrators, and the imposters. The took shots at the establishment from the outside, embracing their place as upstarts, rebels, and anarchists. From nothing came something—one of the greatest cultural movements of all time: the ethos of Do-It-Yourself that fueled their drive. From music and fashion to art and design, D.I.Y. became the a force of liberty, equality, and modernity. It produced some of the most iconoclastic images of the time, which are beautifully showcased in the new book Oh So Pretty: Punk in Print 1976-80 by Toby Mott (Phaidon).
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Read the Full Story at Crave Online
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Bored Stiff #1, C. Terry et al., Tyneside Free Press, July 1977, [dims unknown]. Courtesy of The Mott Collection