The Sixties, by Robert Altman

‘My calling in life was to record the wonder of the Sixties.’ These are the words of celebrated Rolling Stone magazine photographer, Robert Altman, whose 1960s snapshots form the current exhibition of black and white prints at the fabulous Idea Generation Gallery.

Spanning musicians, actors and filmmakers, as well as the ordinary (or extraordinary) generation of people who communed to crystallise the counter-culture of their time, Altman’s photographs depict an era of enviable optimism.

1959 saw the start of the Vietnam war, and in the early 1960s the US army’s involvement in supporting anti-communist South Vietnam caused outrage across the States, helping to feed the famous spirit of revolution that so clearly marked the era. Anti-war Americans responded by staging protests, singing and dancing their way around Haight-Ashbury and Golden Gate Park, and living by the new rules of free love. The idea that the common man could change the world was born. This new form of idealism, a reaction not only to war but to the polemics of race and human rights, was carried out by masses of slim, long-haired people, whose physiognomies clashed entirely with those of their parents’ generation.

Altman’s comments on these images root him specifically in the spirit of the time, using fittingly ‘groovy’ language: ‘We were aware that our full tilt boogie was making a definite difference.’ Whatever this full tilt boogie was, we can be sure that it encapsulated all of the revolutionary sentiment evident in photos like Culture Clash. The picture takes in a San Franciscan anti-war march, with several hirsute, partially-clad protesters mingling in the foreground with an older generation of close-shorn cops with grim expressions and contrastingly dark uniforms.

The Riot depicts another establishment versus hippy scenario in People’s Park, Berkeley, where a 1969 rally turned into a full-scale riot over the reclamation of the park, resulting in one civilian death and many injuries. Leap of Faith, taken at the 1969 Black Panther Party rally to free Huey Newton (one of the party’s founding members imprisoned on suspicion of murdering a police officer), shows a female Newton supporter halfway through a joyful leap, a foot off the ground. In these first shots, elements of struggle and unrest are evident, but through it all shines a hope for change.

Just as you’d expect in a collection from this decade, there are also many harmonious images of people frolicking in fields and holding hands. Here, Altman’s focus is on the behavioural impact of the free love movement in the late sixties, with stills of naked bodies daubed in paint, acid-relaxed faces, frantic dancers frozen in mid-air contortions, and most of all, an abundance of hair – hair flying in the wind, crowned with flowers, or tumbling onto bare shoulders. The physical appearance of these men and women is perhaps the most striking protest of their time, and the concern it caused middle America is obvious in Sign Of The Times, a shot of a 1967 billboard advertisement. A Dylanesque curly-haired figure stares broodingly at the viewer, next to the text: ‘Beautify America, get a haircut’.

Possibly the most astonishing photographs in the series are the musician portraits, such as the intense close-up of Iggy Pop, looking as frighteningly toned as he does today. A lonesome Elton John sits at the piano with his back to the camera, while a fresh-faced Mick Jagger looks a picture of composure. Other portraits include shots of Ray Charles, Chuck Berry, The Grateful Dead, and Janis Joplin, but the most captivating is a stunning Tina Turner stomping her way across stage. These pictures get up close and personal with some of the most iconic musicians, whose revolutionary sounds gelled firmly with the spirit of the time, and whose fame is undiminished in today’s market. And whereas the aftermath of the hippy generation may not be that tangible for your average person today, the music is still as relevant, if in a more commercial context.

Next in the sequence are other key figures of the time, such as Groucho Marx with signature cigar, civil rights activist César Chávez, a bog-eyed, chain-smoking Jean-Luc Goddard, and a baleful Dennis Hopper at a low point in his early career. LSD advocate Timothy Leary grins unashamedly into the lens, and Merry Pranksters Ken Kesey and Ken Babbs are captured in the van that took them on their famous psychedelic drug-enhanced journey across America – about as far removed from the naïve bus ride in Cliff Richard’s saccharine Summer Holiday (1963) as it could possibly be.

From expressions of all-encompassing love, to significant political upheaval, to the many disarming portraits of the people behind the ideology of the sixties, this collection distils the essence of ‘wonder’, as Altman puts it, of a decade we all wish we’d been a part of.

Lara Kavanagh

The exhibition runs until the 29th of August at the Idea Generation Gallery, 11 Chance Street, E2 7JB, Admission : Free,  www.ideageneration.co.uk