Haphash designers Nigel Waymouth and Michael English were at the center of the burgeoning countercultural art and music scene in London in the late 1960s. The swirling forms and sexualized imagery of this poster for the debut single by the band Tomorrow recall the decadent spirit of 1890s illustrations by Aubrey Beardsley (the subject of a popular 1966 exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum). EMI, the recording company behind the song, rejected the poster as too sexually provocative. The title "My White Bicycle" also had political overtones, referencing an anarchist student group in Amsterdam that left white bicycles around for use free of charge.
Gallery label from From the Collection: 1960-69, 2016.