Punk – Fotogafias De Salvador Costa 1977
Paul Drummond says… Following an 8-page contextualising essay (in Spanish) by Jordi Vargas, which clearly acknowledges the roots of punk, Punk photobook begins in the window of Swanky Modes and the desolate streets of Camden, before moving to the Roxy in Covent Garden. Costa was clearly visiting London during the Spring of 1977. It’s unclear where the photos are taken as only the band names are specified and clearly some of the performers are wearing different outfits to those shown in the 100 Nights at the Roxy.
Bands featured: The Models, Cortinas, Cherry Vanilla, The Jam, XTC, The Lurkers and Generation X, The Stranglers & Mr Rotten hanging out. Again the book’s value is the reportage style documentation of the scene. It’s not hard to see what interested Costa, there are plenty of cute punk girls, shots of legs and bums [he was particularly enamoured with Cherry Vanilla’s bottom bits!], and other sartorial details.
Punk77 says: A valuable companion book to 100 Nights at the Roxy. The atmosphere drips off the pages and the design is perfectly suited to its subject. Again for a club that only ran for three months, it packed so much in and generated so much publicity but given the sudden media interest in Punk, the Roxy Club was THE place to photograph this strange new scene and the bands and fans.
In April 1977 Salvador Costa, a 29 year-old photographer from Barcelona, came to London to investigate the punk scene. He photographed bands at venues including the Roxy and the 100 Club, paying particular attention to the audience members and details of their clothes and accessories. On returning to Barcelona, Costa showed his photographs to Juan José Fernandez, editor-in-chief of Star magazine. Fernandez proposed that a book of the photographs be published in their Especial Star series which with the exception of one other title was devoted to comics. Punk was a success, resonating with the post-Franco Spanish youth, and was distributed throughout Spain and Europe in book and record shops. Oliver Wood Books
Paul Drummond is the author of the fantastic Eye Mind which is the story of the 13th Floor Elevators and has many items such as the above for sale at his excellent site Pleasure Of Past Times
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