Punk Rock!! So What?
Birmingham City University, September – December 2015
Following the emergence of punk in the UK, USA and Europe in the 1970s, the subculture spread widely. As punk and new wave gained commercial and critical success, together with an attractive notoriety, it began an ongoing journey around the globe – both as a product and as an ideology. More than forty years after the proto-punk progenitors of Detroit and New York unconsciously launched an underground revolution, and after untold premature obituaries, it appears that punk – in terms of music, philosophy, and identity – remains in rude health. Punk scenes continue to thrive as far afield as Russia, South America, India, China, Japan, the Middle East and Indonesia – 2011 saw the first official Saudi Arabian punk record release, while other scenes have established their mark in Madagascar, Algeria, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, even Tibet and the Himalayas.
Nearer to home, an underground punk scene never actually went away and continues to ‘mutate and survive’– with actions ranging from continued support for longstanding and established bands and scenes to the network of small-scale gigs, fanzines, music distribution, social and political activities of a truly cross-generational subculture. This exhibition, curated by designer and punk historian Russ Bestley, featured a range of punk graphic and visual material spanning the past forty years, demonstrating connections, stylistic conventions, patterns of engagement and the evolution of punk’s visual language and identity across diverse regions and cultures.
