Not on display

Keith Richards

Photograph
ca. 1967 (photographed)
Artist/Maker
Cooper, Michael (photographer)

For over a quarter of the century, the photographs of Michael Cooper have been identified with the chronology of the Rolling Stones. His documentation of the years he knew them, from 1963 to his death a decade later, has ensured that his name is synonymous with the band.

He was also involved with the London art scene of the sixties. The Robert Fraser Gallery in Duke Street, Mayfair - to which Cooper became attached in 1964 - played host to the incipient Pop Art movement as well as to established artists such as Jean Dubuffet and Rene Magritte.

This portrait of the Rolling Stones' Keith Richards was taken by Cooper in 1967.

Object details

Category
Photographs
Object type
Photograph
TitleKeith Richards (generic title)
Materials and techniques
Gelatin-silver print
Brief description
Photograph of Keith Richards taken by Michael Cooper ca. 1967.
Physical description
Black and white photograph of Keith Richards. He is crouched down and has a blanket over his head and shoulders.
Dimensions
  • Frame height: 1295mm
  • Frame width: 1095mm
  • Frame depth: 40mm
Style
Sixties
Gallery label
(1999)
Michael Cooper 1941-1973

For over a quarter of a century, the photographs of Michael Cooper have been identified with the chronology of the Rolling Stones. His documentation of the years that he knew them, from 1963 to his death a decade later, has ensured that his name is synonymous with the band. Part of its fact - and its mythology.

He was also involved with the London art scene of the sixties. The Robert Fraser Gallery in Duke Street, Mayfair - to which Cooper became attached in 1964 - played host to the incipient Pop Art movement as well as to established names such as Jean Dubuffet and Rene Magritte.

Cooper typically photographed in available light and in a documentary style. He turned photojournalist proper - though commissioned by no-one - to record two occasions when the counter-culture stood firm against the establishment, calling for the cessation of American military involvement in Vietnam. Cooper turned his camera on the riots at the Democratic Convention, Chicago, in the summer of 1968 and the disturbances in the same year outside the American embassy in London.

The subjects of Michael Cooper's photographs were, as he said "not just faces that I have photographed but people I have worked with or become involved with on a very personal level". They are an intimate chronicle of the cultural and political climate of a vibrant moment of history.

Robin Muir
Credit line
Given by Adam Cooper
Production
Printed at a later date
Subject depicted
Richards, Keith
Summary
For over a quarter of the century, the photographs of Michael Cooper have been identified with the chronology of the Rolling Stones. His documentation of the years he knew them, from 1963 to his death a decade later, has ensured that his name is synonymous with the band.

He was also involved with the London art scene of the sixties. The Robert Fraser Gallery in Duke Street, Mayfair - to which Cooper became attached in 1964 - played host to the incipient Pop Art movement as well as to established artists such as Jean Dubuffet and Rene Magritte.

This portrait of the Rolling Stones' Keith Richards was taken by Cooper in 1967.
Bibliographic references
  • Christoph Grunberg, ed. Summer of Love: Art of the Psychedelic Era London: Tate, 2005. 239 p. : ill. (some col.) ISBN: 1854375954.
  • Muir, R. You Are Here: Michael Cooper - The London Sixties, 1999
Collection
Prints, Drawings & Paintings Collection
Accession number
E.2065-2004

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Record createdNovember 17, 2006
Record URL
https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O129274/keith-richards-photograph-cooper-michael/
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