The Barney Bubbles Estate is thrilled to announce that, for the first time in more than four decades, the sleeve of a new album by a contemporary group will feature an original Barney Bubbles artwork.
The cover of TRACES by London quartet The Great Leslie incorporates this previously unseen design of four dancing figures – do they spell YA YA? – from the Estate’s archive.
Typically quizzical, the hand drawn idents are cast here representing each of TGL’s members and are juxtaposed with a band portrait by Christian Lombardi.
We have also given our blessing for the design to appear on select limited edition band merchandise. Watch this space and check out the TGL website here for more news and detail of this exciting collaboration.
This pendant is a standout in the new Barney Bubbles Jewellery collection and is of course based on one of the designer’s most recognisable artworks, the smiling hand featured on the front cover of Nick Lowe’s 1979 single Cracking Up.
7in sq sleeve for Nick Lowe’s Cracking Up/Basing Street, released on the British independent label Radar in May 1979The ident appeared in music press adverts for the single, though the spot colour used in the inkies lessened the impact of the originalBubbles had more control over colour balancing for the Cracking Up poster, which measured 50 x 75cm
Made from an original, hand-built master using mixed metals, the pendant is cast in recycled silver and finished with a stainless steel chain. Part of an open edition, each piece is individually cast and hand-finished, resulting in subtle variations that make every necklace one of a kind.
Each pendant is packaged in a bespoke box featuring the toothy smile, which Bubbles appropriated from a photograph of the late keyboardist Bob Andrews (Brinsley Schwarz/The Rumour), who played on the track and others from Lowe’s album Labour Of Lust.
We’re really pleased to announce that after months of tests and tweaking we’re launching the Barney Bubbles Jewellery range!
Click on the image above to check out the Barney Bubbles Jewellery Shop featuring the exciting launch collection consisting of a baker’s dozen of pieces including badges, brooches, pendants and earrings.
These are based on the design maestro’s stunning artworks for a range of artists from space rock through punk and new wave, including Dr Feelgood, Elvis Costello & The Attractions, Nick Lowe, Hawkwind, Johnny Moped, John Cooper Clarke, Ian Dury & The Blockheads and Rockpile.
We’ll be featuring the stories behind individual pieces here over the coming weeks, with insights into the origination of each design and the ways in which it has been realised in 3D.
Prices range between £25 and £120 for the Barney Bubbles jewellery collection, which is shipping worldwide and is a collaboration between the Barney Bubbles Estate and sculptor/jeweller Blaine Hurdle.
‘Barney Bubbles’ oeuvre reads like a full-circle scale-model of UK pop culture in general: a circular journey, from the sharpness of mod (A1 Good Guyz) to the fuzziness of psych (the lysergic space travels of Hawkwind), and back again to the angularity of punk (Stiff, The Damned).
‘As much as Bubbles was a product of those times, he also was a producer of those times – irreversibly shaping the subcultures that shaped him. He created a graphic language of objects and signs (signs as objects, objects as signs) that truly defined an era – a language that still bewitches us, decades later.’
Experimental Jetset
Experimental Jetset 2018: Erwin Brinkers, Danny van den Dungen, Marieke Stolk. Photo: Kotoko Koya
Mixing post-punk sensibilities with graphic design innovation and avant-garde polemic, Amsterdam collective Experimental Jetset puts the ‘provo’ into provocation.
Founded in the mid-90s, the trio of Erwin Brinkers, Danny van den Dungen and Marieke Stolk consistently challenge the bloodlessness of much contemporary graphic design by incorporating clashing collages, signs, symbols and signifiers with declamatory typography and tonal audacity into their cross-media approaches.
One of the studio’s first designs was the perforated A2 bi-weekly programme poster originally produced for the hallowed Amsterdam venue the Paradiso in 1996. The template is still in use at the Paradiso, latterly featuring the 2010 version which was the result of what EJ describes as a ‘slight redesign‘.
Triptych of posters for group exhibition Graphic Design: Now in Production at Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2011.
Installation view (detail) of the retrospective Word-Things in Time-Space at Riot, Ghent, May–September 2016.
EJ’s profile was raised way back in 2001 when the John & Paul & Ringo & George shirt was released through Japanese t-shirt label 2K/Gingham. This of course soon became a band t-shirt design staple.
Offset-printed A2 poster for the EJ-curated exhibition about Amsterdam’s radical Provo movement at the city’s W139 art space in 2011.From the graphic language created for New York’s Whitney Museum of American Art in 2012-13.Installation view of EJ’s 2023 exhibition at MACRO, Rome’s Museum of Contemporary Art.Statement and Counter-Statement is the title of EJ’s 2015 monograph published by Amesterdam’s Roma Publications.Spread from Statement and Counter-Statement.Spread from Statement and Counter-Statement.
In 2022 Experimental Jetset collaborated with Amsterdam-based streetwear label Patta on what they describe as ‘a slightly pop-situationist/mod-revivalist’ capsule collection Patta Psychogeographic Practice.
Patta Psychogeographic Practice Converse All Stars.Patta Psychogeographic Practice manifesto.Record sleeve for Escape-ism’s 2024 album Charge of the Love Brigade, released by Radical Elite Records.
Visit EJ online archive here and read It’s Nice That’s wide-ranging interview with Experimental Jetset where they mention Barney Bubbles here.
Barney Bubbles wasn’t just a designer – he was a visionary. His work brought colour, dynamism and a sense of bold expression to every project. He taught me that design isn’t just about aesthetics – it’s about emotion, energy and creating something that speaks to the heart. Raissa Pardini
This is the first in an occasional series of contemporary practitioners providing their thoughts on the continuing relevance of the work of Barney Bubbles.
Concert poster
From Tuscany and based in London after sojourns in Berlin and Glasgow, Pardini’s work expresses vibrancy and wit, showcasing her considerable talents as a multi-disclipinary designer who is also a radical typographer and joyous creative director.
Concert poster
‘Coming from a tiny town where nothing much ever happened, I took my first solo trip to London at 14,’ said Pardini recently. ‘I quickly learned the art of sneaking into Trash and the indie clubs, full of makeup and nerves, hoping no one would clock my age. Back in Italy, all I could think about was being involved in music. I hustled my way into a local radio station, then hit the national ones, eventually landing my own show.
Record sleeves
‘I played bass with local pals in their garages, spinning records just to secure a couch to crash on after gigs—most of which I seemed to be attending alone. Getting my driver’s license was a game-changer, as it meant I no longer depended on others for rides to gigs. By then, I had built my own communities around different cities, and being part of the music scene became my lifeblood.
Concert posterMagazine design
‘I was printing zines in my mom’s office, and that’s when I discovered my love for design too.’
Book designs
As her portfolio shows, Pardini’s designs are collected by the V&A and she has worked with major brands and bands from MTV and Nike to Blur and The Rolling Stones but retains a street-level engagement having DJed live and on radio stations, played in such groups as Loaded and collaborated with the amazing likes of Yassassin and Cumgirl8 (who she manages – see below for a great promo directed by Leah Hennessey featuring a Susan Sontag AI hologram – you have to sign in to watch it but it’s worth it).
The Barney Bubbles Estate’s Instagram feed has now gathered more than 5,000 followers and is collecting more every day.
Presenting a regularly updated and rich mix of design history and ephemera, @barney_bubbles_estate has great engagement. Followers keenly contributing comments and views on the examples of the late graphic artist’s exemplary body of work, from art student sketches to promo videos to rare posters to record sleeve extravaganzas.
The account also provides news on developments in the wild world of Barney Bubbles; soon there will be trails for a series of major forthcoming collaborations with contemporary artists and designers.
This is the colour version of the drawing by musician Ed Hamell – of the band Hamell On Trial – which appears on the inner sleeve of The Paranoid Style’s new album For Executive Meeting.
Hamell also contributed to the lyric video for the album’s lead track tribute to Bubbles, including the interpretation of the cover of Elvis Costello & The Attractions’s album Imperial Bedroom – watch out for it at 02.00 in the clip:
++ Left: New Barney Bubbles Muleskinners T; right: Julian Balme’s tribute for The Commuters, 1980 ++
42 years separate the designs in this great photo, which pairs the new official Barney Bubbles Muleskinners T-shirt on the left with the one-off tribute on the right designed in 1980 by Julian Balme for the UK post-punk R&B group The Commuters.
Both belong to Peter Stanfield, the group’s harmonica player who is these days a prominent pop culture academic and author, notably of the recently published Pin-Ups 1972.
++ Writer/musician Elizabeth Nelson with her copy of The Wild World of Barney Bubbles courtesy @paranoid_style on Instagram ++++ Matthew Higgs, director/chief curator of White Columns Gallery in NYC, posted this to his IG account @matthewhiggs2015 ++
The Wild World of Barney Bubbles is published in the US today and it’s already making waves.
Writer/musician Elizabeth Nelson, whose band The Paranoid Style has a tribute to the late graphic artist on their forthcoming album, says: ‘It’s a visual feast and a must-have for fans of Bubbles, Stiff Records, album art, typography, design, music, beauty and inspiration writ large. Go get one wherever you buy literature!’
