Punk and It's Appropriation
Source: Anarchy UK
I have already touched on Punk and have given examples of how this has been appropriated in today's society but since starting my presentation I have found other interesting sources and ideas and want to put them here.
Firstly when I types 'subversive punk' into google, one of the first images I found was this:
Initially I thought, that's a good contrasting yellow to the black and white. Then I thought well, as far as my research has taken me, if you label something as subversive, it take's the subversion away. But Punk was a subversive movement so it is fair to label it as a subversive culture (even if the whole 40 years of it haven't been subversive). I followed it to it's original location and was met with this page:
I then found a different version, although it is only the title that differs:
Punk Ideologies
"Punk rock is an amalgam of radical antiestablishment ideology alongside a sense of assemblage, where anything goes. Within the punk ideologies there is a nondirectional approach. There is no linear direction; rather, a feeling of floating is apparent. This is aligned with the state described by the postmodernist philosopher critic Roland Barthes. The idea is not necessarily one of destruction, but a notion of creating movement pertaining to or rocking the law. Punk ideology carries with it a feeling of disorientation, the mood of flux constantly shifting perspectives of stability. What may be perceived as a constant will suddenly be changed as another set or sets of images is presented." -Jacob (2016, p.2).
In his article 'Punk Rock', Jacob writes, "Punk Rock is a rock music genre as well as a culture that emerged in the 1970s in the United Kingdom and the United States. As part of the postmodernist framework, punk rock and its associated ideologies, music, fashion styles, and subcultures are contextualized within the tenets of this theory and time. The mood and mode is one of radicalism, an amalgamation of eclectic stylistic influences often mixed as fusion. From nihilism to protest, from antiestablishment to anticommercialism, punk music and punk ideology weaved into each other. Punk rock was about the people playing the music getting the sound into the popular culture, advertising their own gigs, and exploding onto the stage to give forward their messages. The culture and its music encompassed a breaking down of barriers and conventions, both musically and socially."
Creative Subversion
Music and fashion are the most notable expressions of the Punk movement, being apparent in modern culture. However there are other forms of creative expression that are a little less associated with the movement such as literature thought the use of Zines, spoken word and poetry as well as the ideas and theories that came from creative subversive thought such as ways to protest.
Zines
Zines could be said to be subversive in their own right. Farrelly says "Zines are the maverick inhabitants of publishing's Wild West, where the obsessional, the idiosyncratic and the wilfully obscure roam free across pages unbounded by the constraints of mainstream agendas." Zines are a good example of using subversion as a creative tool, to create something that is attractive to an audience that identifies itself as being subversive or that is attractive to the notion. This isn't just with Punk but with the subcultures that zines fit into.
Source: Hage, E (2017)
Hage, E. (2017, p. 180) writes "the zine was a cheap, quick means of expression and
communication. These zines also model how periodicals are dynamic sites that
foster cross-fertilization and interaction, and productively hold materiality and
ephemerality, mediation and immediacy, in tension." She goes on to say "Borrowing performance theorist
Philip Auslander’s formulation, these zines were “performance documents.”
Appropriation
appropriation
əˌprəʊprɪˈeɪʃ(ə)n/
noun
- 1.the action of appropriating something.
"dishonest appropriation of property" - 2.a sum of money allocated officially for a particular use.
"success in obtaining appropriations for projects"
I have previously given examples of the appropriation of punk fashion within our consumer culture, you can find this post here or take a look for yourself on ASOS. When I was looking at this, I was reminded of a fad that happened a few years ago when celebrities such as Chris Brown started wearing painted leather "Punk" jackets.
Chris Brown wearing jacket created by Noel Austin. Source here.
This sort of thing wasn't new but it was sort of unusual to see a jacket that looked hand made (that is hand made, just not by him?) on a celebrity. When I was younger I worked in the hell hole that is New Look, fucking hated working in such a pile of consumerist bullshit shop. In there they often had little flurries of "alternative" clothing, bringing in tartan skirts, tops with some sort of "rebellious" slogan on and they often has Ramones t-shirts. At the time there where a lot of shops like H&M selling band shirts like this, Ramones seemed to be everywhere (which was actually quite good for me as they where one of my favorite bands at the time) but there where also Misfits and Nirvana amungst others. I thought it was cool that I could buy one if I had the money (which I didn't) but didn't really get why big high street brands would want to sell shirts with underground bands on. At the time I didn't blame the people who bought these shirts and didn't know who the band where because the shirts where everywhere and someone might purchase one, not knowing that it was a band. Although I did speak to some people and they just thought the band was cool but had never really listened to them. What?
I admit that with the little money that I did earn, I invested in a Ramones t-shirt, but I was largely seen as a "freak" being called skank almost every day at school by my own personal bully (well, that's what he wanted to be anyway). I wanted to support the bands I listened to, most of my clothes where ripped not by choice but by being worn down by gigs and just generally being old. I listened to punk music but didn't identify myself as 'Punk'. However my look, what ever it was, bought unwanted attention, girls and boys started fights with me purely because of what I looked like. This isn't an uncommon story but I am finding that some of these people now that we are older, are some of the people buying into this "rebellious" look being sold in high street shops. The ones that used to make fun of how I dressed, often yelling from passing cars or as they left from school, "mate you look like a boy" or "get some new clothes" etc. I actually saw one of the girls who used to mock me calling me a "dirty goth", wearing dark red lipstick, some obscure band t-shirt (obscure to her too I have no doubt) and she had added some pink or something to her hair. Awesome.
Big brands have pretty much been commodifying the punk aesthetic since punk came to be but it seems to be extremely apparent recently. Something that was so anti-fashion, anti-consumption has become easy fashion, accessible to buy, to wear and to fit in nicely with all the other trendy shoppers.
Source: Walking Contradiction
I discovered in an article by Rotten Fruit that Urban Outfitters where doing this jacket a few years ago. I looked into this further and found an article on Vice where they asked Penny Rimbaud, one of the founding members of Crass what he thought of the jacket. Find the full article here.
"[...] I personally don’t have any troubles with it. I mean it amused me that Crass is sort of the main feature on it and the Sex Pistols and the Clash dropped down to the bottom. But they haven’t actually used the symbol so it’s not really an unacceptable use; it’s more of a naff artwork than an attempt to sell a Crass jacket. As far as I’m concerned, if the wealthy want to spend $400 on a rather naff leather jacket and go to book launches and gallery shows and all the things that those literati and glitterati do, then that’s great because it means that we’re getting the name floated around in areas where it’s very difficult for us to penetrate. I actually quite like it when people like Angelina Jolie and David Beckham wear Crass T-shirts."
I have already mentioned that I looked at ASOS and their "Punk" clothing but here are some other results from other brands:
H&M:
What I've noticed recently, especially with H&M is the use of visuals that make the clothing look like its band merchandise when it isn't. It looks a lot like the sort of aesthetics used by modern Hardcore Punk bands. I remember seeing someone in a pub with a hoodie that replicated the font used a lot by hardcore bands, it has a small design on the front, a large back design and some writing on the sleeves. I went over as I couldn't read the writing and was exited to meet someone that might be interested in the same sort of music as me (it basically never happens in Portsmouth). However after we started talking it became very apparent that he had no idea what I was talking about and he explained that he just liked the design. I thought "ah I wonder if he found it online or something...". I them begun to realize that lots of people where wearing similar items of clothing. I then discovered that this was actually just modern high street fashion.
Anyway you get the picture.
Some other interesting discoveries where made however when searching the internet for "punk appropriation".
Source here
This is what the comment reads:
At first I didn't really understand then as I looked at the image I realised that they were One Direction shirts! The guy who posted this is making fun of the person who left the above comment but I would say that who ever they are has a point. Although I guess it doesn't really matter anymore. It's all gone so far, I'm not sure even the band symbols mean that much anymore. For example the iconic Black Flag bars have come so far from their origin that they are pretty mainstream, people even get tattoos of them purely for their "cool" status. I'm not sure they mean anything anymore.
I was going to get together some images to demonstrate what I meanst about the bars but I have found a Tumblr that devotes it'self to the Black Flag bars: Black Flag Logo. There's honestly no point in me going further, it's all there. However here's a good video that talk a little bit about the logo and the artwork that features the artist Raymond Pettibon who is someone I greatly admire and is someone I consider to be subversive:
As I continued with my search I came across this gem:
I have found more like this since. So there you have it folks. How to wear "Punk". That's something I haven't really mentioned, coloured hair. I have been colouring my hair for around 12 years (what the fuck, where did that go?) and when I begun to colour, the died where pretty hard to find but thankfully I lived close to Brighton and found a cheep dye (that I then mixed with food dye and cheep conditioner to make it last longer). Now, dye is everywhere! This is actually not a terrible thing for me as I can now buy pretty good dye in Boots and to be honest, the stuff I used to use is now the same price and the Boots stuff. However, just like being teased for the way I dressed, I was often teased for my hair. Not only teased and made fun of but turned away from jobs. Having gone through all that growing up to now be faced with people every day that now colour their hair bright colours. That's not saying it's fully acceptable, I still got turned away from a job this year for having coloured hair as well as a shaved head. They actually told me this was why. I'm diverting a little.
I just want to share this one last site; Polyvore "global style community". It has a page for "Punk Belle" where you can 'get the look'.
On this site, it allows you to create your own look, so I did. Using the power of punk, I searched and this is the outfit I came up with:
Hope you enjoy the new "Punk" look. What a deterioration of something that mattered. I am concluding with this search that subversion is something that is not only subjective but ever changing and fleeting. Once subversion appears, especially it it does it in a successfully creative manner, rendering it interesting and "cool", I would argue that it starts losing that subversiveness almost straight away. Punk is dead, or at least the fashion is.
Bibliography
Book
Farrelly, L. (Ed.). (2001). Zines. London: Booth-Clibborn.
Article
Hage, E. (2017). Bay Area Dadazines and Punk Zines in 1970s San Francisco: Interactive, Ephemeral, Live. American Periodicals, 27, (2), 180-205.
Jacob, L. (2016). Punk Rock. Salem Press Encyclopedia, 2.
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