Caroline Coon

Caroline Coon has generously produced a limited edition print on the occasion of the exhibition, Women in Revolt! Art and Activism in the UK 1970-1990, at Tate Britain, 8 November 2023 – 7 April 2024.

Coon’s limited edition photograph celebrates and pays respect to Ari Up, vocalist of the London punk rock band The Slits and fellow female artist challenging the status quo. Coon, who photographed and wrote about the London punk scene in the 1970s, selected this image from her archive to focus on the women of punk, who were an important part of the movement but historically under acknowledged compared to their male counterparts. The close of Ari Up’s Jubilee knickers worn over her black PVC trousers is symbolic of this under representation, wearing something which is normally hidden, boldly and defiantly for all to see.

Each print is signed and numbered by the artist and comes unframed. Courtesy of the artist and Stephen Friedman Gallery, London and New York.

• Artist Caroline Coon
• Artwork Ari Up in her Silver Jubilee Knickers, Sussex University, Brighton, 15th June 1977
• Exhibition Women in Revolt! Art and Activism in the UK 1970-1990
• Dimensions 33 x 48 cm
• Material Photographic print on Platinum Baryta 300gsm paper
• Edition Edition of 30, signed and numbered on the back
• Date of work 1977/2023

Caroline Coon (b.1945, London, UK) is a painter, writer, photographer and political activist. She has campaigned for women’s rights since the 1960s; co-founded Release in 1967, a legal-advice agency for young people charged with the possession of drugs that continues today; and was central to London’s punk scene, managing The Clash from 1978 to 1980. Coon studied Fine Art at Central Saint Martins in the mid-1960s, opting for figurative painting which was deemed unfashionable at the time. Inspired by feminism and the politics of sexual liberation, Coon’s unique paintings contest binary notions of gender and oppressive patriarchal values. Her photography work captures artists including the Sex Pistols, The Clash, The Damned and The Slits, and are some of the most iconic images from the early punk rock movement in England. Her photographs can be found on record covers and in public collections such as the National Portrait Gallery, UK.

Selected solo exhibitions include Caroline Coon: Love of Place, Stephen Friedman Gallery, London, UK (2022); Caroline Coon: In the Arena, J Hammond Projects, London. UK (2021); Caroline Coon: The Great Offender, TRAMPS, London UK (2019); Caroline Coon: The Great Offender, The Gallery, Liverpool UK (2018); TYPICAL GIRLS punk photographs, by Roberta Bayley and Caroline Coon, James Hyman Gallery, London, UK (2016). Selected group exhibitions include Scandal ’63 Revisited, Leicester de Montford University Gallery, Leicester, UK (2023); Writing her own script: Women photographers from the Hyman Collection, Embankment West Gallery, London, UK (2023); Sensitive Content, Unit, London, UK (2022); Mixing it Up: Painting Today at the Hayward Gallery, London UK (2021); Breakfast Under The Tree curated by Russell Tovey, Carl Freedman Gallery, Margate, UK (2021); QUEER AS FOLKLORE, Gallery 46, London, UK (2021); Dear Christine..., ArtHouse1, London, UK (2020). She lives and works in London.