Days of Punk
| BOOK GALLERY
January 26, 2022
EXPOSICIÓN ‘DAYS OF PUNK – MICHAEL GRECCO’ - La Térmica, Málaga
MICHAEL GRECCO
Days of Punk
La Térmica, Málaga
February 4 – June 26
Opening: Friday, February 4, 8 pm
Encounter with the artist Michael Grecco, 6 pm
Curator: Mario Martin Pareja
La Termica presents the exhibition “Days of Punk” by American photographer Michael Grecco which includes more than a hundred black & white and color shots of artists including Johnny Rotten, The Buzzcocks, Talking Heads, Human Sexual Response, Joan Jett, The Clash, David Bowie and the Ramones, among many others.
From the late ‘70s to the early ‘90s, photographer and filmmaker Michael Grecco documented the nightclub and concert scenes in New York and Boston when punk exploded in the U.S. and later morphed into post-punk and new wave movements. Down and dirty in the thick of things, onstage and backstage, Grecco captured for posterity a riotously outspoken time in pop culture history, with all its raw energy, emotional power, and outrageous antics.
Born in New York City, Michael attended college in Boston, Massachusetts, where he began his professional career shooting for the Associated Press and covering the music scene for the legendary FM radio station WBCN-FM. It was the heyday of punk rock’s arrival in the U.S. While he was shooting at concerts and in nightclub as a working photographer, Grecco – a self-described “club kid” of the time – had a unique opportunity to embed himself in this revolutionary scene as both a chronicler and a participant.
After these images sat dormant in flat files for decades, Grecco and his archivist decided to revisit them. Their efforts lead to his latest book, Punk, Post Punk, New Wave: Onstage, Backstage, In Your Face, 1978–1991 (Abrams Books, 11/10/2020), and the accompanying multi-media exhibition, “Days of Punk.”
The coffee-table volume features 162 previously unseen images – including backstage and onstage moments – that are available to collectors for the first time in exclusive limited editions. Grecco’s personal anecdotes from his times hanging out with the musicians he was shooting add further depth to the book.
These photographs are the centerpiece of the “Days of Punk” exhibition, which premiered at the international photography fair Photo London in 2021, and will subsequently travel the world, starting with its installation at La Termica.
The show experience is augmented by soundscapes created in collaboration with members of the cult band Mission of Burma. A video component of the exhibition includes some archival footage that Grecco himself shot back in the punk era.
