Iconic album cover sketch up for sale
NEW YORK — An old sketch up for auction May 20 at the Hard Rock Cafe in Manhattan is a crude, ink-on-paper drawing of the iconic Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club album cover. The artist is almost surely John Lennon. The significance is another story.
Julien’s Auctions told The Associated Press that the sketch was discovered by a former resident of the house in Weybridge, England, where Lennon lived from 1964-68, when he was married to his first wife, Cynthia. The artwork is clearly an outline for the Pepper cover, showing the Beatles gathered in the centre, the group’s name spelled out in front of them and circles in the back that would be filled in by such famous faces as Bob Dylan’s, Fred Astaire’s and Oscar Wilde’s.
The drawing is undated, and it could be a draft of the finished cover or an idle doodle from later on. Julien’s estimates its worth as $40,000-$60,000.
“What we have here is nothing less than one of the most important artifacts in connection with the early development of what is considered by many to be the most important pop and rock album of all time,” Perry Cox, author of Official Price Guide to the Beatles and other books, contended in a recent email.
“Sgt. Pepper” was released in June 1967, nearly 50 years ago, and there is no definitive account of the cover’s creation. But until now, no one has suggested that Lennon was involved in the planning stages. Jann Haworth, who with fellow Pop artist and then-husband Peter Blake won a Grammy in 1968 for best album cover for Sgt. Pepper, told the AP that “John was wholly absent from discussions about what the cover was to be.”
Paul McCartney had all along taken the lead in wanting a “concept” album and told biographer Barry Miles that he submitted ink drawings that Blake and Haworth turned into the finished design.
Blake and Haworth have different memories. Blake has said he recalled a “vague” conversation with McCartney, while Haworth said a “funny little sketch” by Blake was the earliest “representation of the cover” and followed a discussion among herself, her husband, McCartney and art dealer Robert Fraser.