How punk was pictured by photographer Caroline Coon

Godmother of punk, Caroline Coon gives us a glimpse into her surviving archive, featuring never-before-seen photographs of musical icons and pioneers of the 1970s punk scene. Her latest show at The Centre for British Photography, ‘Nothing to Lose: The punk photographs of Caroline Coon’ is divided into three parts: The Clash: A Relevant Rebellion; Punk: A Very Contemporary Significance; and Word and Image: Personal and Political Statements. Each section has been developed into a boxed set, with only ten works available from each – the very first time Coon’s photographs of the punk movement have been editioned.

Coon worked in the vanguard of London’s nascent punk scene. Initially, she wrote for Melody Maker, a weekly British music magazine, before creating artwork for bands such as The Police and The Clash – whom she even briefly managed. She was the author of one of the first books published on punk; 1988: The New Wave Punk Rock Explosion provides an insider’s look at the emerging music scene. Her interviews and reviews interrogated the attitudes held by some of the pioneers of punk towards gender and sexuality.

As the peace and love ethos of the ‘60s cracked under the socio-economic struggles of the ‘70s, Coon documented the angst of the disenfranchised and alienated youth. “In 1976, I saw the Sex Pistols perform their second gig and immediately I recognised a galvanizing new expression of sub-cultural revolt.” Coon said, ahead of the exhibition. Coon’s photographs in ‘Nothing to Lose’ document these exhilarating early days of punk, and reveal intimate, behind-the-scenes moments with iconic bands including The Clash, Sex Pistols, The Buzzcocks and The Slits.

Unappreciated at the time, Coon’s photographs took on a life of their own in the ‘90s, when the fascination with the subculture was renewed, and the movement’s cultural significance gained wider recognition. “Unfortunately, the darkroom where my films were developed had moved, and many of my negatives were lost”, Coon adds. “The photographs in this exhibition, some from negatives and others restored and printed from scratched contact sheets, are a glimpse of what has survived from this revolutionary moment.”