Dissertation

CHAPTER 1
THE 1960S
The ‘60s had a generation of baby boomers
from the Post-World War II era who weren’t
burdened with the fear and struggle of war. The
youth of the 1960s had more freedom than their
previous generations.
The most well known societal changes in the
‘60s were the increase in use of recreational drugs
such as marijuana and hallucinogenic drugs like
LSD. Other important changes include the rise
in feminism seen with the mini skirt, and the
legalisation of the contraceptive pill for women
in the US. These changes directly affected the
graphic designers and art directors’ creative
output at that time which is reflected in
psychedelic art and pop art movements.
The swinging sixties was where the boom
in pop culture branding for pop musicians
began. Stephen Heller and Véronique
Vienne (2012, 202) describe in their book,
100 Ideas that Changed Graphic Design, that
the 1950’s and 1960’s were a time of, ‘creatively,
progressive rock LP’s that exploded with
unconventional covers. These covers emerged
from a younger generation of art directors and
design innovators.’ With changes in society and
a more progressive youth, this made way for
changes in artist expression. This can be described
in the book, Icons, Classic Rock Covers (2004, 72),
‘There was a full-tilt war between adolescence
|and age – it was US against THEM. US had long
hair, free love and expanded consciousness, new
highs, new lows, new clothes and new music.
THEM were stunting, straight, selfish, archaic
and imperialistic. All this was communicated
through the expanding music scene.’ Some of
the most iconic pop culture movements in the
mainstream music industry were discovered or
developed from the 1960’s onwards, such as
rock’n’roll, the hippy-folk movement, punk,
disco, electronica and indie, to name a few.
21