FMP — Exploring Punk Subculture (Part 4)

Research Part 3

6 min readDec 5, 2022

Survey

After my initial research with the locals, I conducted a survey with my primary users to understand their interests when it comes to subcultures. As someone who grew up in the 90s, I needed to gain more knowledge about the history of 70s music and its impact on the next generation of youth. During my initial research a book called Live at the brixton academy by Simon Parkes. I found this book quite inspiring as it was about Simon’s journey (Former owner of the Brixton Academy, London) and how a music venue transformed the locality and identity of Brixton through the music from the 70s-90s. Based on the stories that I read in this book, I hypothesised that the music you listen to during your youth influences your personality and identity in some ways. Therefore, I asked open-ended questions in the survey to get a deeper insight into what it is about the music that people wanted to know. Finally, I conducted a thematic analysis based on the study to identify the underlying themes from the survey data I collected.

The following are the prominent themes that emerged from the survey -

Common themes emerging from user’s responses

Some users had prior knowledge of punk music. Still, they were keen on learning more about the meaning behind the songs and how punk became famous as a subculture. This research method helped me narrow down and finalise the content for my project.

Punks during the 1970s (*Museum of Youth Culture* 2022)

Practical Review

During my practical review, I found several online archives like museum of youth culture, google arts and culture and bored teenagers. These online archives are great examples as they capture the essence of the punk subcultures. I remember visiting the Museum of Youth culture pop-up exhibition on Carnaby Street a few months ago. What I found most interesting about these archives is the way they tell stories about the subculture.

Grime Stories: An exhibition at Museum of London (Mansfield, 2022)

I also found another exhibition that captured the origins of Grime as a subculture. Grime stories was a small exhibition in the Museum of London that explained how Grime emerged as a subculture. Most of these exhibitions were visual. One aspect I thought was missing in these exhibitions was the stories behind the music and the artists. Very few exhibits were interactive; because of this, there was a gap in engaging all senses in these exhibitions.

The Sound of the Earth by Yuri Suzuki at Triennale Milano

During my summer break, I visited an exhibition called “Unknown unknowns” at Triennale Design Museum, Milan, which I found very inspiring and engaging. I thought The Sound of the Earth by Yuri Suzuki was exceptional because of how he used people’s collective voices and created a situated yet authentic representation of the earth through an only audio format which was quite immersive and authentic.

Playing the unknown by Francesco Bianconi (*Viaggisportvacanze,* 2022)

I also thought Playing the Unknown by Francesco Bianconi was fascinating. Bianconi created an audio-visual installation based on the concept of a Mellotron, a rudimentary form of sampler instrument popular in England during the 1960s and 1970s rock music to play with people’s perception of sound in the dark. Each key triggers a seven-second audio loop and plays a part of a single track of L’Ignoto (a soundtrack designed by him) in the installation, along with a video of the ocean’s depth. The installation’s objective was to experience the unknown, presented through a decontextualised and indecipherable clip. I found this installation quite powerful because it engaged all your senses using a single instrument. Based on these inspirations, I decided to create an audio-visual installation that would help people understand the influence of punk music on youth’s identity based on the insights I found during my research.

Soho Punk tour

To learn more about the punk subculture, I decided to go for a walking tour that would cover the lost punk venues of London. The tour was organised by Aidan by Flipside tours. Aidan told us about the history of Soho’s lost punk venues. During this tour, we covered around 8–10 places that told us about the iconic venues where bands like The Sex Pistols and The Clash had performed. I enjoyed the tour as Aidan gave us detailed insights about the different locations and explained the rise and fall of the Sex Pistols particularly. Most of the people on this walking tour were tourists who happened to be music enthusiasts. Although I enjoyed the information shared by Aidan, I could not visualise the places without any images and felt that the tour was a little fast-paced. Despite living in London for a year, I had not explored the places we visited during this tour, and I wished I could spend more time in specific locations. But overall, I found the tour very insightful. Since I had recently watched the new documentary called Pistols by Danny Boyle, I could relate to some of the stories that Aidan shared.

Aidain from Flipside tours showing us around Soho’s punk history

Crazy 8

After researching for weeks, I was excited to try out ideas for my installations. To use my time efficiently, I used the research method of Crazy 8 to sketch and shortlist ideas for my installation quickly. Considering the time and resources available, I funnelled down to two ideas and created small-scale prototypes for them. Then, based on the feedback from my mentors, I started designing the life-size installation I had in mind. I made a portable two-sided installation that could be placed in any public space. The concept behind this installation was to tell how punk subculture evolved based on the journey of the band Sex Pistols.

Prototype and testing

The Sex Pistols were one of the most iconic British punk bands from the UK. They changed the perception of punks and inspired a generation of artists, designers and political activists through their music. I wanted to tell their stories through music and visuals using the installation as the medium. The primary purpose of this installation was to create awareness about how punk music influenced designers, musicians and youth culture in terms of art, fashion and politics.

Making the large scale prototype of the installation

During my mid-term presentation, I received feedback that although the installation was a good idea, the contents of this installation were too text-heavy and less experiential. On the other hand, the music helped the installation to seem more engaging. Still, it could have communicated the stories of the Punk subculture better. One of the main reasons was that it seemed more formal and less punk due to its size and structure. Therefore, I decided to research further what constituted punk subculture and improved my design accordingly.