Punk

Jamie Reid

After the 1960`s graphic design was not solely ruled by people who were trained to be designers.  In fact, there were a lot of artists that were self taught and were ignorant to the traditional rules governing graphic design; instead they just made stuff up as they went along.  In the 1970`s and 80`s graphic artist associated with punk rock disregarded order and traditional principles of design resulting in disorder and deviation. To these artists there was no such thing as an error.  Posters that were made by band members were silkscreened or Xeroxed in basements and garages and then attached to walls and telephone poles. These edgy images showed that anyone could do these posters regardless of the level of skill you have. Just like Dada, Punk was created in order to challenge mainstream culture but ended up becoming mainstream itself. One of the most important artists during this time is Jamie Reid. 

Jamie Reid - God Save the Queen 1977

Jamie Reid`s anti-design inventions became synonymous with graphic design with it angry punk look. Reid designed posters, adverts and t-shirts for the sex pistols after being asked to do so by their manager Malcolm McLaren. Reid used to go through articles from newspapers and magazines and cut out headlines in order to use them in a different context, changing the original meaning or message. He therefore used several different collage techniques as well as random and atypical typography. One of the most well known works for the sex pistols is ‘God Save the Queen’. The original image was to celebrate the British monarch`s silver jubilee. Reid took this picture of the Queen and covered her face with rough torn parts across her eyes and mouth and instead wrote the single`s title and the band`s name which were formed by cut-up ‘ransom note’ letters. This single cover was very infamous at the time as it was a very shocking image. There are various different versions of this cover including one where the union jack is used as a background and another were here eyes and lips are not thorn but instead a safety pin is attached to her mouth. The safety pin at the time was used to hold a baby`s diaper and so, this made this cover even more shocking creating a large controversy. 

Jamie Reid - God Save the Queen 1977

Jamie Reid - God Save the Queen 1977

Fanzine

Anarchistic album covers along with magazines by fans also known as ‘fanzines’ started to become very popular during this time. The anarchistic qualities of the fanzines and Dada were quite alike however, whilst fanzines had a homemade quality to them, dada remained artistic. In addition these fanzines were not proofread and there was no censorship so the artist was free to do whatever he wanted without having any restrictions.  The increasing popularity of this ‘do it yourself’ approach was also due to oil crisis of 1973-74 which marked the end of post-war affluence and marked the start of rationing, protests and social conflicts. People therefore started to look for inexpensive ways of doing things and motivated them to be creative and artistic resulting in the increasing popularity of these magazines.

I personally find these works Particularly exciting. It is as if I can sense the energy of the atmosphere and the enthusiasm of these fans just by looking at these posters.It makes me want to create such works so that people who view my own work could feel this youthful energy and passion.

References:

Rick Poynor, 2003. No More Rules: Graphic Design and Postmodernism. Edition. Yale University Press.

Steven Heller, 2012. 100 Ideas that Changed Graphic Design. 3.3.2012 Edition. Laurence King Publishing.