‘I got £100’ for Sgt. Pepper’s
ECLIPSED ARTIST WHO HELPED CREATE FAMOUS COVER TELLS HER STORY
The cover of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Beatles’ bestselling album, has etched itself into pop culture. Five decades on, the brightly coloured lineup of John, Ringo, Paul and George surrounded by a celebrity motley crew remains instantly recognizable. This record sleeve is still, despite his 60-year career, Peter Blake’s most famous work — something his representatives say “gets a bit tedious.”
Blake didn’t, however, work alone. His then wife, American artist Jann Haworth, says she was jointly commissioned by art dealer Robert “Groovy Bob” Fraser. But she’s been largely left out of the history of the cover’s creation as other characters, such as Paul McCartney, have shuffled to the fore. Now, as Sgt. Pepper’s approaches its 50th anniversary, she tells her story.
The accepted narrative of the cover is that McCartney drew up the concept for Blake to bring to life. “Paul’s sketch was the inspiration for the artwork,” McCartney’s representatives claim. In an interview published on a Beatles fan site, McCartney said: “I took the whole cover idea to (Robert Fraser); he represented Blake.”
Haworth claims never to have seen the sketch. “The first I heard of this was very recently,” she says.
Such stories pervade pop music’s history like cigarette smoke, and Haworth suggests that the cover can be scoured for artistic fingerprints. “If one wanted to be a detective, the clues exist in the work.”
Haworth refers to Blake’s collages and his fascination with depicting heroes — both fundamental to the cover. Haworth, meanwhile, had used life-size models in her work since 1962.
Haworth moved to London in 1961, aged 19. The daughter of artist Miriam and Oscar-winning art director Ted Haworth, she had grown up in Hollywood, “around Hitchcock and on the set of Some Like It Hot.”
She studied at the Slade school of art, where in 1963 she proposed an exhibition that led her to Blake, who she married after a whirlwind romance.
The couple, who were married 16 years, were both represented by Fraser, who opened his gallery in Mayfair in 1962 and swiftly became known for launching artists into Swinging London.
By the mid-’60s, Fraser was mingling with The Beatles, and was among the first to hear chunks of Sgt. Pepper’s while the album was being recorded. Design collective The Fool had been working on the cover but Fraser, Haworth says, “thought it didn’t do justice to the music he was hearing.”
Blake and Howarth were suggested as alternatives and work began in the early days of 1967, with meetings at record company EMI and outings with McCartney and his then girlfriend Jane Asher.
Blake and Howarth lived and worked in a one-bedroom flat in Chiswick, and it was here that the artists, McCartney and Fraser “jammed, not even for long, on what this could be.” Blake then drew up “the first sketch and the only sketch” that Haworth is aware of.
The four discussed the cover’s most famous aspects: the drum that contained the album title, the choice of heroes and the floral planting that spelled out “Beatles.” “I wanted to do a take on civic planting, and there happened to be a flowerbed clock near Hammersmith. I referenced it because I knew that Paul and Robert would be going home that way,” Haworth says.
She brought in fairground painter Joe Ephgrave to create the drum. “I’m pretty sure he was paid £25 ($44). That drum has been used and reused.” For a while, the skin hung on McCartney’s wall. In 2008, it sold for £540,000 ($942,586) at Christie’s.
“We asked The Beatles to choose the heroes,” Haworth recalls, “but they didn’t choose enough to be the crowd. Peter and I chose over half.” Contrary to reports, Ringo Starr was involved, putting comedian Issy Bonn on the list. John Lennon, meanwhile, offered a more contentious choice — Hitler — who was eventually removed.
The lineup was bolstered by Haworth’s sculptures, in particular those of the Old Lady and Shirley Temple, with waxworks of The Beatles, controversially on loan from Madame Tussauds for the first time.
The shoot itself took place at a studio in Chelsea, on March 30. Haworth doesn’t recall a “big reveal” moment when The Beatles walked in, although there are photos of Lennon on set out of costume. Other reports of the shoot feature chaotic scenes, loud soul music and skeins of marijuana smoke in the air.
Rock history claims that Blake was paid £200 for his efforts, but Haworth specifies: “He got £100, because I got £100,” a fee she describes as “fine.” She, like Blake, was awarded a Grammy for best album cover.
Haworth seems to have few regrets, and she says she doesn’t want celebrity, but she would like credit for collaborating on the cover.
“All that fame business ...” she trails off. “Perhaps we need to grow up and move past that now.”
I WANTED TO DO A TAKE ON CIVIC PLANTING, AND THERE HAPPENED TO BE A FLOWERBED CLOCK NEAR HAMMERSMITH. — AMERICAN ARTIST JANN HAWORTH