You Say You Want a Revolution – Records and Rebels 1966 – 1970 is the new exhibition blockbuster at the V&A Museum which opens on Saturday 10th September.
Anyone with an interest in the amazing 1960’s youth-quake will love this exhibition, there is just so much material that it seems incredible it all happened in just 5 years and graphic design aficionados will especially love it for all the album and wall art displayed.
I count myself as incredibly lucky to have been born late enough to have benefited from so many of the reforms that this period ushered into womens lives, just the mere fact of finally being able to have a mortgage in their own name let alone the pill, abortion reform and equality laws made a hug=e difference.
The exhibition tasks itself with a wide ranging look at everything revolutionary, music and fashion do feature but also political and social barriers being smashed play as important a part.
The beginning is a recreation of Carnaby St with Mary Quant outfits, a dress store front with a Twiggy mannequin and coat hanger and a Vidal Sassoon hair salon which on every other Sunday will become a live hair cutting salon with competition winners on display. Handwritten lyrics for some of the best known Beatles songs including ‘Help’ are here but we were not allowed to photograph them.
Photographs and artworks connect throughout the exhibition with relevance to the displays, album covers are everywhere and music from the collection of DJ John Peel plays through the headphone sets supplied.
Political events from the 1968 Paris riots, Martin Luther King and the Black Panthers, Che Guevara and womens liberation groups are all covered in depth. The advertising revolution, the introduction of credit cards and the rise of television also created the conditions for the global world we all know now.
The big room has a projection of the film Woodstock with a shag pile green turf carpet and large green bean bags to chill out on, scattered around the edge are classic rock outfits worn in concert from Mama Kass, Roger Daltrey and Mitch Mitchell and examples of design by Bill Gibb, Ossie Clark and Thea Porter.
You leave to the sound of Imagine and see John Lennon’s brown velvet jacket worn in the promo film for the album. Could it all happen again? You feel the kids of today also have need of protest but in our saturated, bombarded, commoditised world if anything erupted it would probably be incorporated and sold in less than half the time it took for the sixties to be commercialised.
Records and Rebels at the V&A, suit by Mary Quant Ginger Group made from furnishing fabric in a William Morris print 1965
Twiggy mannequin in a Biba dress with Twiggy theme coathanger at the V&A Museum You Say You Want a Revolution exhibition
Vidal Sassoon Sunday salon area at the V&A Museum in Say You Want a Revolution opening Sat 10th Sept
Fashion exhibited from Biba, Hung on You, Mr Fish, Foale and Tuffin,Granny Takes a Trip, Jeff Banks and far right Mick Jagger’s jumpsuit by Ossie Clark at the V&A Records and Rebels
John Lennon and George Harrison’s original outfits for Sgt.Peppers Lonely Hearts Club band at V&A You Say You Want a Revolution
Hundreds of albums are scattered throughout the exhibition including a record store type wall where you can rifle through stacks of LP’s, this group form part of the third section of political revolution at the V&A Records and Rebels
Pop paper dress issued by the Campbell Soup Company as a promotion giveway in return for two Campbells vegetable soup can labels 1966
Kaftan by Thea Porter and Outfit worn by Mitch Mitchell in the big main Woodstock chill out room at the V&A Museum for You Say You Want a Revolution
Merchandising galore in the V&A store with a fantastic selection of retro badges for sale in the spirit of You Say You Want a Revolution
You Say You Want a Revolution runs at the V&A Museum from 10th September 2016 to 26th February 2017. In partnership with the Levi’s brand, sound experience by Sennheiser, and additionl thanks to the Grow Annenberg Foundation, Fenwick and Sassoon.
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