Production Social does PUNK
We’re at Twitter’s London office and it’s time for a fierce and fresh Production Social. There’s a rusty Dalek in the entrance hall (unrelated) and this year we’re celebrating Punk’s revelled and notorious officious 40th birthday. It’s a homage to the pioneers that fought for a way of living, for the differences, for the empowerment of a discouraged generation and for a voice found in originality.
We celebrate the relationship between culture and ideology. We are saluting the people that make things out of the ordinary, those who push the boundaries of their generation. People who make things happen, the power of doing and the embracing of imperfection.
Punk is alive and kicking today
So say the night’s first speakers: AMV BBDO Cultural Strategists Gerard Crichlow and Max McBride-Peterson. They took us back to 1976. Apple was founded, there were record heatwaves in London, the Notting Hill Riots were blazing and the Concorde made its first passenger flight from Heathrow Airport. In summary, it was a year of social unrest and technological innovation. With that came the punk attitude: question everything and anything (Henry Rollins) — and a general rebellion against the establishment. Of course, being anti-establishment is very, very much alive today. Punk lives on!
The art of not being so refined
Artist, designer and punk historian Toby Mott was born and bred slap bang in the middle of the heyday of Punk in London. At the time, punk may have seemed to be about destroying things, but now we can see its creative value for what it is. Maybe it’s just because Britain was pretty depressed at the time that it yielded such prolific DiY style creativity. Looking at where we’re at today — we might very well see a new wave of rebellious creativity emerging (if we make it so, get busy, folks!).
Computers are punk
Alex Klein is on a mission to “create a future of makers in a present of consumers”. Because, says the multi-talented designer-and-journalist-turned-tech-entrepreneur, there are over a billion connected devices in the world and more consumers than ever with absolutely no control over the commodity they trade in: their attention. Inspired by the furious curiosity at Cambridge which led to wild experimentation (they’ve sent all sorts into space) he built KANO, a DiY computer that’s a simple and fun to put together as Lego (and way easier than Raspberry Pi). Because we all want 3 pretty punk things when it comes to tech: to make & play, to look inside and to take control over our own futures.
A salute to creativity that’s actually a bit rubbish
Rock music in the late 1970s had a problem: it was all too tame. You could even say that time was generally just a bit “meh”. Enter “noble, shit rock ‘ roll” (Joey Ramone). Back when Alan Cowderoy was at the birth of indie label Stiff Records, he says musical proficiency was seen as a bit suspicious in punk. Things needed to be shaken up, snap decisions needed to be made, and so began a culture of slap-dash fearless creativity. We’ll have some of that please, but maybe we’ll hang on to our proficiency his time around.
Fight for your right to be arty
Craftivist extraordinaire Carrie Reichardt was only wee went punk came around, but fortunately her big brothers were well into it, and punk quickly taught her that girls shouldn’t just listen: they should be heard. Punk embodies doing whatever the fuck you want, and the creativity that embodies happens to have changed her life for good (pun intended). She founded the English Hedonists and made them a mosaic blue plaque and her Chiswick home (aka The Treatment Rooms) covered in tantalising tiles. Her art is rebellious, full of colour and humour and a spirit of fearless fight for a world that’s better and brighter.
Punk = controlling your own destiny
Yes, yes the music industry is in a pickle today. Major labels are raking it in, but most musicians are all but scraping by as being signed does not in any way equate to being able to afford half an attic in Tooting or Deptford any more. BUT, says Brian Message (ATC, manager of many, including Radiohead and PJ Harvey) this is the age of opportunity. Because sure, streaming services are helping to screw over the artist big time, but that’s not the true disruptor of the business model. What is genuinely game changing is how cheap and fast it has become to create music. And with services such as Kobalt, this means the creators don’t have to rely on major labels any more and they can take a far more punk approach to bringing their music to an audience. Message applauds that this puts more power in the hands of the artists. ATC management financed Nick Cave’s pre-album film that was released exclusively to 850 cinemas ahead of the album release, and PJ Harveys new album was recorded as a live exhibition that was open to the public. It seems that a good injection of “stick it to the man” attitude can make the future of the music industry a lot more promising.
Eye Want Change — film that’s stopped waiting for white men’s funding.
We live in a time of false representations about gender and race, so we have to say “fuck you, we’re not going to wait for your funding” and tell the real stories, so says journalist and documentary film maker Jade Jackman. She’s young, driven by social justice and has a seriously punk attitude to making film. Bypassing the establishment entirely, her platform Eye Want Change carves out a new space for everyone — and especially women of colour — to tell their stories filming on their mobiles. They run a competition, in 2016 judged by the Guardian’s head of documentaries Charlie Phillips and BAFTA nominated Daisy May. And Jade Jackman says it’s about more than opening up the fort of established media, because people are so disillusioned, they don’t believe the TV any more. But they still enjoy creative content, especially in video format. A new DiY approach to telling stories can help make the world a little less white cis male establishment and a little more socially fair, we have a lot to look forward to.
Watch the 2016 Eye Want Change winner here.
The Panel — on punk and parties
Debs Armstrong — founder of Shangri-La: Punk is a way to surpass a controlled environment and do what you want. The aesthetics of punk have had their time, but the ethics live on.
Artist Agata Kay: The most important thing is community — that way our shared ideas can grow and spread.
Illustrator McBess: The moment you start thinking about what other people want you to do, you’re not punk.
What effect will Brexit and Trump have on art?
Debs: We can wonder if the liberal left has in a way become the new establishment. Now the veil of illusion has to be lifted and something has to break. And that’s where the importance of parties come in, because real art doesn’t happen when it’s scheduled to — there’s a need to break barriers. That’s when the special stuff happens.
So that’s it. Let’s party and get arty! Happy Christmas.
