Ahead of the opening of a new exhibition at the Lowry Hotel, About Manchester talks to photographer Kevin Cummins the man who amongst many highlights in a career stretching back forty years will always be remembered for that one shot in the snow.
In a way I was lucky that so early on my career I was framed by that photo, Kevin Cummins tells us, but in a way I painted myself into a corner that snowy day in late 1970’s Manchester.
Thirty six years on, the picture of Joy Division has become one of the most iconic photos of the music industry and Kevin’s pictures will almost alwatys make the listings of the best shots in global awards.
It became, says Kevin, an emblem for the city and looking at the band in that frame, you almost know the kind of music that they would play. The music and the genre were part of what Kevin was trying to promote then along with the New MusicalExpress, music that apart from the John Peel show,had no outlet into the world.
Kevin tells us that a guy in Santiago Chile, told him that when he saw that picture, it took him six months to track down and listen to the music from the band.
It seems remarkable to us now in this interconnected digital world, but back then ,the first exposure a band, often still without a record deal, had, would be an article in the music press and an accompanying set of photos.
Kevin’s work is returning to the city, across the Irwell at the Lowry Hotel this July in an exhibition to coincide with their purchase of four pictures to hang behind reception and in addition will be buying three more images to show on each of the hotel’s six floors.
The four images represent the best of Cumming’s work associated with the city.The gates of the Hacienda, the G-Mex before its redevelopment, the Stone Roses at Spike Island and Johnny Marr captured in Salford.
To launch the schedule, there is an exhibition featuring fifty images that were used in a show that was in Paris last year.It had a Manchester slant says Kevin but comes with pictures of other people to show that “I do other themes and occasionally leave the city.”
From those early days capturing Manchester’s music scene, Kevin has gone on to amass an enviable portfolio which has won him global acclaim among music fans and art collectors alike, wmusic fans and art collectors alike, with commissions for London’s National Theatre and countless album covers.
His work adorns walls across the world both in private collections and on permanent display in the likes of The Victoria and Albert Museum and the National Portrait Gallery. The Stone Roses covered with paint or Morrissey draped upside down over a monitor have become definitive images of our times, and demonstrates how Kevin gained the trust of the artists he worked with.
It was when he was photographing the Smiths when Kevin first realised that he was the curator of what would become an important archive and when editing his book of Manchester photographs realised just what a massive collection he had amassed.
Kevin has published many books including his latest “Assassinated Beauty” which captures the career of the Manic Street Preachers and many of the portraits, including the last known photographs taken of Richey Edwards.
Back to the 1980’s and Kevin along with the likes of Stuart Maconie, John Harrison and Paul Morley were championing the Manchester scene. It was ironic that we were talking in a week whe it was announced that the New Musical Express was to be given away free after its sales had plummeted to five teen thousand ( seven of those are subscription says Kevin).
How then would a young photographer get on in 2015? Not very well was the reply with the likes of Google having destroyed the copyright laws.
This is a subject that Kevin feels passionate about, ( just check his Twitter feed ) and we explore further. Google and the likes of not doing it for ultraristric reasons, they know that once copyright is abolished, they will be free to circulate works for free.
“If you destroyed copyright you will destroy all of the creative profession.Why would anybody make a movie or go into the theatre if they didn’t own their own work? Why would write a novel if the second that it is presented to your publisher you no longer own it?
We could have talked for hours on that topic but to return to photography and perhaps some optimistic tips for budding Kevin Cummins’ we talk about the rules for photographing bands. ” You have to remember you are not the most important person in the room and you keep looking at your watch”
Seventy five per cent of his job he says is waiting in hotel lobby’s. “Don’t try to be their best friend and invite yourself around to dinner.” And remember you are only as good as your last photograph.
Kevin left Manchester in 1987 but periodically shuttles back to his home town, a place that has greatly improved since the Joy Division days, ” a European city with rain that no longer looks like Leipzig or Poznen.”
With all the changes, could another Madchester scene emerge? No, he thinks not because there are not good bands, but with the global scene now, it will be difficult for pockets to emerge. Now he says someone in San Fransisco can look at their Twitter feed and find out what a band member is having for their breakfast.
Kevin points to the controversial film about Amy Winehouse out at the moment which he says is the first documentary to be put together in the new world of social media. Her career mirrored the start of the age of the camera phone and the obsession with documenting everything.
I would have been devastated when I was growing up if I had woken up in the morning with a picture of what David Bowie was having for his f********ing breakfast
Rock and Roll should be mythologised but now all its secrets are laid bare to the audience in real time.The age when the dressing room before and after a gig was a secret sanctity has gone.Kevin says the age in which he took the pictures helped to create that mythology.
As to the future, Kevin is currently working on a book about the Sex Pistols last ever gig in the UK with Sid Vicious which took place in Huddersfield on Christmas Day in 1977 and is in negotiations with Film on Four about a yet to be revealed project.
Kevin Cummins’ iconic rock images are on show at Lowry Hotel July 15 – Aug 3
Images Copyright Kevin Cummins
