Hipgnosis were an English art design group, based in London, that specialised in creating album cover artwork for rock musicians and bands. [1] Their commissions included work for Pink Floyd, Def Leppard, T. Rex, the Pretty Things, Black Sabbath, Wishbone Ash, UFO, 10cc, Bad Company, Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, Scorpions, the Nice, Paul McCartney & Wings, the Alan Parsons Project, Yes, Genesis, Peter Gabriel, Electric Light Orchestra, Rainbow, Styx and Al Stewart.
Hipgnosis consisted primarily of Cambridge natives Storm Thorgerson and Aubrey Powell, and later Peter Christopherson. [2] The group dissolved in 1983, though Thorgerson worked on album designs until his death in 2013. Powell has worked with Paul McCartney and the Who in film and video production, and as the creative director for both Pink Floyd and their lead guitarist David Gilmour. Christopherson went on to produce music videos for many bands and shot some of the earliest promotional photography for the Sex Pistols, but worked primarily as an electronic musician in the bands Throbbing Gristle, Psychic TV and Coil until his death in 2010.
In 1968, Thorgerson and Powell were approached by their friends in Pink Floyd to design the cover for the group's second album, A Saucerful of Secrets . This led to additional work for EMI, including photos and album covers for the Pretty Things, Free, Toe Fat and the Gods. Being film and art school students, they were able to use the darkroom at the Royal College of Art, but when they completed school, they had to set up their own facilities. They built a small darkroom in Powell's bathroom, but shortly thereafter, in early 1970, rented space and built a studio located at 6 Denmark Street. [3]
When first starting out, Powell and Thorgerson adopted their name from graffiti they found on the door to their apartment. Thorgerson said they liked the word, not only for punning on "hypnosis", but for possessing "a nice sense of contradiction, of an impossible co-existence, from Hip = new, cool, and groovy, and gnosis, relating to ancient learning." [4]
Hipgnosis gained major international prominence in 1973 with their cover design for Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of the Moon . The final design was one of several versions prepared for the band to choose from, but according to drummer Nick Mason, the 'prism/pyramid' design was the immediate and unanimous choice. The record itself became one of the biggest-selling and longest-charting albums of all time, and the cover has since been hailed as one of the best of all time (VH1 rated it as No. 4, in 2003[ citation needed ]). After that, the firm became highly sought-after, and did many covers for high-profile bands and artists such as Led Zeppelin, Genesis, UFO, Black Sabbath, Peter Gabriel, the Alan Parsons Project, and Yes. They also designed the cover for a UK paperback edition of Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (Adams would describe Thorgerson as "The best album designer in the world"), [5] [6] as well as the original UK hardcover edition of Norman Spinrad's Bug Jack Barron . [7]
Peter Christopherson joined Hipgnosis as an assistant in 1974, and later became a full partner. The firm employed many assistants and other staff members over the years, including freelance designers and illustrators Richard Evans, [8] George Hardie, [9] and Richard Manning. [10]
Hipgnosis did not have a set fee for designing an album cover but instead asked the artists to "pay what they thought it was worth". [11] According to Thorgerson, this policy only occasionally backfired. [12]
Hipgnosis' approach to album design was strongly photography-oriented, and they pioneered the use of many innovative visual and packaging techniques. In particular, Thorgerson and Powell's surreal, elaborately manipulated photos (utilizing darkroom tricks, multiple exposures, airbrush retouching, and mechanical cut-and-paste techniques) were a film-based forerunner of what would, much later, be called photoshopping. Hipgnosis mainly used Hasselblad medium format cameras for their work.
Hipgnosis covers were noted for their quirky humour, such as the cover for the Pink Floyd double-LP compilation A Nice Pair , which featured an array of visual puns. Another example was the album There's the Rub for Wishbone Ash using a picture of cricketer and ball.
Such humour once angered Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin, when Hipgnosis created a visual pun based on "(tennis) racquet"/"(noise) racket" for the album Houses of the Holy . Hipgnosis almost lost Led Zeppelin as a client as a result. [13]
Another trademark was that many of their cover photos visually related to the album's lyrics, often depicting puns or double meanings of words in the album title. Since both Powell and Thorgerson were film students, they often used models and staged the photos in a highly theatrical manner. Hipgnosis covers rarely featured artists' photos on the outside, and most were in a gatefold cover format to provide ample space for their imagery.
Many of Hipgnosis' covers also featured pen and ink logos and illustrations designed to appear high-tech (often by graphic designer George Hardie), stickers, fancy inner sleeves, and other packaging bonuses. One of the extras created by Hipgnosis was the specially printed inner sleeve for Led Zeppelin's In Through the Out Door LP, which was black and white but turned to colour when dampened with water (tying in with the main cover's photographic theme).[ citation needed ]
Houses of the Holy is the fifth studio album by the English rock band Led Zeppelin, released on 28 March 1973 in the United States and on 30 March 1973 in the United Kingdom by Atlantic Records. The album benefited from two band members installing studios at home, which allowed them to develop more sophisticated songs and arrangements and expand their musical style. Several songs subsequently became fixtures in the group's live set, including "The Song Remains the Same", "The Rain Song" and "No Quarter". Other material recorded at the sessions, including the title track, was shelved and released on the later albums Physical Graffiti (1975) and Coda (1982). All instruments and vocals were provided by the band members Robert Plant (vocals), Jimmy Page (guitar), John Paul Jones, and John Bonham (drums). The album was produced by Page and mixed by Eddie Kramer. The cover was the first for the band to be designed by Hipgnosis and was based on a photograph taken at Giant's Causeway in Northern Ireland.
Tales of Mystery and Imagination (Edgar Allan Poe) is the debut studio album by British rock band the Alan Parsons Project. It was released on 25 June 1976 in the United Kingdom and Ireland by Charisma Records and 20th Century Records in the rest of the world. The lyrical and musical themes of the album, which are retellings of horror stories and poetry by Edgar Allan Poe, attracted a cult audience. The title of the album is taken from the title of a collection of Poe's macabre stories of the same name.
Meddle is the sixth studio album by the English rock band Pink Floyd, released by Harvest Records on 5 November 1971 in the United Kingdom. The album was produced between the band's touring commitments, from January to August 1971 at a series of locations around London, including EMI Studios and Morgan Studios.
Peter Martin Christopherson was an English musician, video director, commercial artist, designer and photographer, who was at one time a member of British design agency Hipgnosis.
Obscured by Clouds is the seventh studio album by the English progressive rock band Pink Floyd, released on 2 June 1972 by Harvest and Capitol Records. It serves as the soundtrack for the French film La Vallée, by Barbet Schroeder. It was recorded in two sessions in France, while Pink Floyd were in the midst of touring, and produced by the band.
Relics is a 1971 compilation album by English progressive rock band Pink Floyd. The album was released in the UK on 14 May 1971 and in the United States on the following day. Initially released by Starline, the compilation was reissued by Music for Pleasure in the United Kingdom, while Harvest and Capitol distributed the album in the United States. A remastered CD was released in 1996 with a different album cover, picturing a three-dimensional model based on the sketch drawn by drummer Nick Mason for the album's initial release.
A Collection of Great Dance Songs is a compilation album by the English rock band Pink Floyd. It was released on 23 November 1981 in the United Kingdom by Harvest Records and in the United States by Columbia Records.
A Nice Pair is a compilation album by Pink Floyd, re-issuing their first two albums, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn and A Saucerful of Secrets in a new gatefold sleeve. The album was released in December 1973 by Harvest and Capitol in the United States and the following month in the United Kingdom by Harvest and EMI. It reached number 36 in the US Billboard album charts and was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) in March 1994.
Inflatable flying pigs were one of the staple props of Pink Floyd's live shows. The first balloon was a sow, with a male pig balloon later introduced in their 1987 tour. Pigs appeared numerous times in concerts by the band, promoting concerts and record releases, and on the cover of their 1977 album Animals.
Storm Elvin Thorgerson was an English art director and music video director. He is best known for closely working with the group Pink Floyd through most of their career, and also created album or other art for Led Zeppelin, Phish, Black Sabbath, 10cc, the Alan Parsons Project, the Mars Volta and the Cranberries.
Argus is the third album by the British rock band Wishbone Ash, released on 28 April 1972. It is their most commercially and critically successful album, peaking at No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart.
No Smoke Without Fire is the ninth studio album by English rock band Wishbone Ash. It was the first album since 1972's Argus to be produced by Derek Lawrence. The album peaked at No. 43 in the UK Albums Chart.
Aubrey "Po" Powell is a British graphic designer. He co-founded the album cover design company Hipgnosis with Storm Thorgerson in 1967. The company ran for 15 years until 1982, and created some of the most acclaimed record cover art of the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s for many of the most famous rock bands of the era including Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Paul McCartney, Yes, Genesis, 10cc, Wishbone Ash, Peter Gabriel, UFO, Bad Company, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Scorpions, Styx, Syd Barrett, and Black Sabbath. The company was nominated five times for Grammy Awards.
Elegy was the final official album release by The Nice, Keith Emerson having since moved on to Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Lee Jackson to Jackson Heights and Brian Davison to Every Which Way. It consists of live versions of songs from earlier releases, a studio take of a Tchaikovsky piece ("Pathetique") that had been released live on the previous album and a previously unheard cover of Dylan's "My Back Pages". Released a year after The Nice's final show in March 1970 in an attempt to capitalize on ELP's burgeoning success, the album achieved number 5 in the UK album chart.
Richard Evans is a graphic designer, art director and illustrator. He studied fashion and textile design at Nottingham School of Art and graphic design and illustration at Leicester College of Art.
George Hardie is an English graphic designer, illustrator and educator, best known for his work producing cover art for the albums of rock musicians and bands with the British art design group Hipgnosis.
Tiny Pictures is the second and final studio album by Canadian rock band Thornley. The album was released in Canada on February 10, 2009, and in the U.S. on February 3, 2010. The first single, "Make Believe," was released to radio on December 12, 2008. Most of the songs on the album have been written for years but the five-year wait since Thornley's last release allowed Ian Thornley to bring on Nick Raskulinecz as producer, whose previous work includes albums with Foo Fighters and Velvet Revolver.
The Endless River is the fifteenth studio album by the English rock band Pink Floyd, released in November 2014 by Parlophone Records in Europe and Columbia Records in the rest of the world. It was the third Pink Floyd album recorded under the leadership of the guitarist, David Gilmour, after the departure of the bassist, Roger Waters, and the first following the death of the keyboardist, Richard Wright, in 2008, who appears posthumously.
Ahmed Emad Eldin is an Egyptian digital artist who came to prominence as the designer of the sleeve of Pink Floyd's 2014 album The Endless River. In 2015, Emad Eldin was chosen by Adobe for their "25 Under 25" list. Emad Eldin has been described as "an acclaimed digital artist and photo manipulator whose work has been displayed all over, from museums to the sleeve of Pink Floyd's album The Endless River" and who "has made a name for himself in the global digital art space" often producing "commercial work" though "much of his artwork comes from his own dreams." Emad Eldin is an Oniros Film Awards winner. His work has been part of exhibitions, including the "Bad Consumers" exhibition at Doge's Palace, Genoa and "Kahlil Gibran: Guide for our Times" at Sotheby's Gallery in London, "featuring nine Egyptian artists, along with 38 others from across the Middle East."
Colin Elgie is an English illustrator and former member of Hipgnosis. He has worked with progressive rock bands and musicians such as Pink Floyd, The Hollies, Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, Renaissance, Genesis, Fumble, Peter Gabriel, Roger Cook, Al Stewart, and Roger Taylor.
[L]es deux de Hipgnosis avaient la particularité de ne pas réclamer de cachet fixe, mais de demander aux groupes de leur payer ce qu'ils estimaient être la valeur de leur travail!(The italics are present in the original.)