THE JOHN HOPKINS of Cambridge University, with a Masters Degree in physics and mathematics and a promising career as a nuclear physicist, became Hoppy, photojournalist and underground activist and co-founder of London's answer to Rolling Stone magazine - International Times aka IT.
This collection of images (with essays by Barry Miles, Joe Boyd, Val Wilmer and Addie Vassic) covers a short, intense period before Hoppy abandoned the camera for alternative politics and event organising, and latterly video works - roughly 1960 to 1966. It focuses on the major concerns of the youth culture of the day - nuclear war, jazz, emerging British R&B bands and the legendary black musical talents touring the from the USA. He briefly held down jobs at the Sunday Times and Melody Maker, which opened the door to many opportunities with the celebrities of the day. But in Hoppy they recognised a fellow traveler anyway. His shots are intimate exchanges. The pictures he took have been refocused by the lens of history and time and become recognised as historical documents. That this might be a surprise to the artist himself in no way diminishes their importance and relevance.
An authentic insight into London society at a turning point in the history of the 20th century.
