Sex Pistols art made in Aberdeen returns for exhibition

David McCracken, pictured with the original image, said it was an important exhibition

An original Sex Pistols artwork which was printed in Aberdeen has returned home to the city to be part of a new exhibition.

Jamie Reid - who died in 2023 aged 76 - was the artist behind the famous punk band's iconic album covers and posters.

He created his first image for the band at Peacock printmakers in Aberdeen in the 1970s.

The venue is now hosting an exhibition of his work - including an original Sex Pistols flyer which was only tracked down in the past week.

Jamie Reid died two years ago

Born in London in 1947, Reid studied at Wimbledon Art School and later Croydon Art School.

He had strong links with Scotland, with his family having Montrose and Inverness connections.

He designed the artwork for the punk band's releases such as God Save the Queen and Anarchy in the UK.

The God Save the Queen cover became one of the defining images of the era, with lettering pasted on top of a photo of the monarch and the union jack flag.

Peacock celebrated its 50th anniversary last year and is now marking the fact Reid made his early artwork on the premises.

Reid designed artwork for several Sex Pistols hits including God Save The Queen

John Marchant, from the Jamie Reid Archive, explained that the artist would be coming up to Scotland regularly as a child, and that carried on in to adulthood.

"He had been at art college with a chap called Malcolm McLaren - who later became the Sex Pistols' manager," he said.

"By 1975, he was getting tired of the city and started going up to Lewis.

"Jamie received a telegram from Malcolm saying you've got to start working on this band that I'm working with called the Sex Pistols."

Reid travelled to Aberdeen where he visited Peacock, an open access printmakers.

It was there he created the first image for the Sex Pistols - a blue flyer, featuring the band's name, and a guitarist image.

John Marchant keeps the artist's archive safe

"We still don't know how many copies of this first flyer were ever made, probably very few," Mr Marchant told BBC Scotland News.

"I have been working with Jamie's archive for years and I've never seen one in the flesh before. I'd seen photographs of one. I know of one in Prague.

"I put the call out through every way I could to see if i could track one of these original flyers down, with no success. But it was so important I felt for us to have one of these flyers here in the exhibition."

Then Mr Marchant's luck "quite incredibly" turned and he heard about someone who had one.

'A real goosebump moment'

"He'd actually bought it directly from Jamie in 1986 for actually quite a substantial sum of money," he said.

"I met with him on Monday. He passed it across to me all framed up, I tucked it under my arm and flew up on Tuesday.

"I purposefully hadn't unwrapped it and waited until we all gathered to take the covers off it. It was quite a moment, it really was. It was a real goosebump moment. And it's here on the wall at Peacock now, and it look splendid.''

He said the exhibition features other original material from the same period, including collage and photographic work.

"He was very politically motivated right to the end, in fact he only got involved with the Pistols because he felt that there was a potential for getting political messages out," Mr Marchant said.

"I'm hoping the exhibition gives people the broader sense of what Jamie was as an artist."

Reid's pieces are held in major institutions such as Tate Britain, New York's Museum of Modern Art and Houston's Museum of Fine Art.

The exhibition in Aberdeen runs until December

David McCracken, the arts and business manager at what is now called Peacock and The Worm, described it as "extraordinary" that Reid's story had such a strong Aberdeen connection.

He said it was "slightly overwhelming" for the organisation that the original print had resurfaced for the exhibition.

"It's a wonderful, wonderful moment," Mr McCracken said.

"It is culturally the most important print ever made at Peacock."

The Eternal Ecstasy exhibition runs from Saturday until 6 December.