Karl Ferris
Encyclopedia
Karl Ferris is an English
photographer/designer, best known as one of the principal innovators of "psychedelic" photography
. A photographer to the “British Rock Elite” - Eric Clapton
, Cream
, Donovan
, The Hollies
and Jimi Hendrix
- Ferris was invited - as a style consultant and their personal photographer - to help create their public images. He was given an insider's access to the “Experience” that helped define the look of the 1960s and influence youth culture and lifestyles worldwide.
After school, and with dreams of traveling to India, Ferris signed up as a steward on a P&O liner that went to Australia via India. After returning to England, he served two years with the Royal Air Force for his National Service (Conscription) as an aerial photographer, where he often flew in jet fighters operating the gun camera during dog fight practice. During this period he became friends with a fellow conscriptee who was a member of a Liverpool “Mersey Beat” group, and he was introduced for the first time to this type of music.
He was invited back to Liverpool
to see a new group - The Beatles - who were appearing at the Cavern Club and was introduced to them there. From that point, he was hooked on “Beat” music from which The Beatles took their name.
After his military service, Ferris immigrated to Vancouver, Canada working as an assistant there to master photographer Harry Nygard. From Nygard, Karl learned the skills of composition, form and texture. He also began an involvement in the “Beatnik” lifestyle and began hanging out in coffee bars, listening to poetry readings and the progressive jazz of such artists as Miles Davis
, Herbie Hancock
, John Coltrane
, Eric Dolphy
and Ornette Coleman
. He photographed his first music subjects at these gatherings for local newspapers and magazines. He also began to take fashion shots of girlfriends and models, building up a respectable portfolio. Nygard told him that he had a real talent in this area, but to further expand his portfolio, he should return to London where the “Mod” fashion scene was creating new opportunities in the world of arts, music and fashion.
In 1964 Karl returned to England and the “happening” Beat scene. Ferris received commissioned work as a fashion and cover photographer for teen magazines 19 and Petticoat and later for Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, French Mode and Marie Claire. These commissions brought him to such locations as Paris, Cannes, Munich, Ibiza and Morocco. When he wasn’t working he would join into the “Scene”, and after meeting (and eventually dating) Denmark’s top “superstar” model of the time (Maude Bertelsen), Karl was introduced to a Pop group called the “The King Bees” who invited him to sing cover versions of Rolling Stones songs with them, and so he began touring in and around Copenhagen with this group.
He eventually returned to England for a “fashion shoot” offer with Vogue. In 1966 The Beatles had just released “Rubber Soul
” and Karl had the chance to meet up with their official photographer, Robert Freeman
, who encouraged Ferris to experiment with different styles of images - which he promptly did – and created his unique psychedelic style. That summer on a trip to the Spanish island of Ibiza
he discovered and began shooting the innovative psychedelic fashion work of designers Simon Posthuma and Marijke Koger – aka The Fool
- and these photos were eventually printed in the fashion section of The Times
. This was the first time such psychedelic photography and fashions had been seen anywhere. He and The Fool were then invited to come to London to shoot some more “Psychedelic” fashion features.
From this work, Ferris received many commissions. He also began working on “Psychedelic Happening shows” during which moving images of colored liquid and photographs were projected over freeform dancers. The likes of Paul McCartney
, Graham Nash
, Eric Clapton
, T Rex, Pink Floyd
and John Lennon
dropped by and began participating - by playing music - with these shows. In 1966, Ferris was also invited to do a stage "Liquid light show" for Pink Floyd, which is believed to be one of the first ever done in England.
in 1967 through musician/producer Chas Chandler
, who had “discovered” Hendrix. Karl received the compliment of a lifetime when Hendrix remarked to him, on seeing his portfolio, “You‘re doing with photography what I’m doing with music - going far out beyond the limits and blowing minds”. Hendrix then asked Ferris to be his photographer and to re-shoot the cover for the UK version of his album “Are You Experienced
” – which he was unhappy with - for the US market. Hendrix said he wanted “something psychedelic to blow the minds of the fans” and that represented his music and style.
And so Ferris began experimenting, using a giant Nikon fisheye lens and a secret Infrared film that had just been released by the military, who had used it for U2 plane spying. This film was given to him by Kodak London who had seen his color experiments going through their Lab. The manager asked Karl if he could find some way to use the Infrared film commercially, so he started using it on Fashion and Rock shoots. Kodak was so please with the results that they gave Karl his first exhibit in their London gallery. Out of this experimentation came the famous “fisheye” photograph used for Jimi’s first US record album cover, which he also designed. His images then appeared on all three US "Experience" album covers released during Hendrix’s short life - “Are You Experienced?”, “Axis Bold As Love”, “Electric Ladyland
” and the Japanese "Smash Hits
".
Karl went on to create the album cover images for Donovan
’s “Gift From A Flower To A Garden”, “Wear Your Love Like Heaven
”, “For The Little Ones” and “Hurdy Gurdy Donovan E.P.” and (again, partnering with The Fool) for The Hollies'
“Evolution
”. He was also instrumental in creating their overall looks for the shoots, which then became their recognized public images. During the years 1967-69, Karl Ferris was one of the preferred photographers to the British rock elite, shooting also many publicity photos for them. He was called "The Icon with the Nikon" by the musicians and Press back then.
In 1968, Ferris accompanied Donovan on his U.S. tour and was commissioned by LOOK Magazine
to shoot a feature article on Donovan, after which he was retained as a 'Stringer' in Europe to shoot images for music articles there. In 1969, Karl's Donovan psychedelic shots were featured in an article in TWEN, the famous German art magazine.
to bring up their son Lorien in that idyllic setting. Joni Mitchell
visited Karl in Ibiza in 1970 on the recommendation of Graham Nash
and was photographed by Ferris. Karl continued shooting fashion and glamour photographs for magazines in Europe and the USA. In 1980, Ferris received a commission from Playboy Magazine to photograph "Welcome Back Kotter" star Melonie Haller
(John Travolta
's love interest and the only female “Sweathog”) for a "Celebrity Pictorial" in the famous Bo Derek
issue. In 1983, Karl married Melonie and they went to live in Hampstead, London near Karl's original 60's studio. In 1984, a daughter Melissa was born in London, and during this time in the U.K., Karl worked shooting glamour and nude photos for Oui, Club and the Raymond Revue. In 1990, Karl was commissioned by Playboy in the Netherlands and Germany to shoot glamour layouts for them. Later, in 1995, Karl and Melonie returned to the U.S. and lived in the New York area, where Melonie Haller-Ferris took on various acting rolls in film and television.
, Karl’s best-known works have been reproduced in a new series of posters and fine art prints that recreated promotional posters of many of the events that Ferris had photographed in the 60’s at such iconic London concert venues as the Royal Albert Hall
and Saville Theatre
and featuring acts such as Cream
, the Jimi Hendrix Experience and Donovan. Also in 2000, Karl was commissioned to supply three of his original 1967 Hendrix photographs for cover and inside booklet of the ultra-premium "The Jimi Hendrix Experience
" box set.
In 2003 Ferris began his quest to revisit a time in music that defined a generation with “The Ferris Experience Happening”. Exhibiting his famous record album cover photographs and a psychedelic multimedia video and slide show, the first of these “Happenings” opened in Vancouver, Canada at The Exhibitions Gallery. It was be the first time in 35 years that such an exhibition had been staged.
In 2005, Karl’s Happening show and photo gallery exhibit began a tour of major cities in the U.S., starting with the San Francisco Art Exchange and continuing in Toronto and other cities in 2006. Also that year, Karl was asked by the Hip-Hop group Sweatshop Union
to shoot and design the album cover for their record titled United We Fall. They admired his “60s-style” approach to photography and wanted something “Beatle-esque” for their new album’s cover image.
In 2006, a feature film documentary called "Revolution" went into production (to coincide with the 40th anniversary of "the Summer of Love"). Also in 2006, Karl's film company Helixus Productions started to film a feature documentary and mini-series called "Revolution - The Cultural Revolt of the Sixties and its Continuing Legacy” which explores the origin, flowering and long-term influence of psychedelia, a subculture that in the 1960s achieved a mass influence.. This film includes over 100 interviews with many of the era’s key innovators and will show how revolutionary new art forms were created as an expression of the counterculture and utilized as a tool for tearing down the existing establishment. A sample of interviews included: musicians Donovan
, Mick Fleetwood
(Fleetwood Mac), Willie Nelson
, Paul Kantner
(Jefferson Airplane), Keith Emerson
, John Densmore
(Doors), Patrick Simmons
(Doobie Brothers) George Hunter
(Charlatans) and Mickey Jones
(Dylan's 1st Electric Band), Woodstock MC Wavy Gravy
.
designers Alan Aldridge
(Beatles), Storm Thorgerson
(Pink Floyd), Alton Kelley, Stanley Mouse
(Grateful Dead), Klaus Voorman (Beatles), John Van Hamersveld
and The Fool
(Simon and Marjke), models Patti Boyd and Charlotte Martin, Jenny Boyd
, actor/activist Peter Coyote
, “Summer of Love
” exhibit curator Christoph Grunenberg, photographers Astrid Kirchherr
(Beatles-Hamburg), Bob Seidemann
, Gered Mankowitz
(Rolling Stones), Bob Whitaker (Beatles) and Herb Worthington (Fleetwood Mac)and many others,
The documentary is a serious investigation of the phenomenon and long-term impact of this cultural shift. In addition to the featured interviews, the film will also include music, period stock footage and current footage of locations of many of the events covered in the film (as well as many psychedelic images which are used as transitions). The film is scheduled to be released in early 2010.
In 2009, a book "The Karl Ferris Psychedelic Experience" of his Psychedelic Hendrix, Donovan, Cream, Fool and Fashion photographs (including a DVD Slide show screensaver) will be published.
Karl is also producing a Trilogy of feature films based on the biography and influence of the 15th century father of Surrealism Hieronymus Bosch. Of which he is also a Writer, Producer, Director and Art Director.
Currently a TV documentary on Karl's work and life "The Karl Ferris Experience" is being finished.
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
photographer/designer, best known as one of the principal innovators of "psychedelic" photography
Photography
Photography is the art, science and practice of creating durable images by recording light or other electromagnetic radiation, either electronically by means of an image sensor or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film...
. A photographer to the “British Rock Elite” - Eric Clapton
Eric Clapton
Eric Patrick Clapton, CBE, is an English guitarist and singer-songwriter. Clapton is the only three-time inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: once as a solo artist, and separately as a member of The Yardbirds and Cream. Clapton has been referred to as one of the most important and...
, Cream
Cream (band)
Cream were a 1960s British rock supergroup consisting of bassist/vocalist Jack Bruce, guitarist/vocalist Eric Clapton, and drummer Ginger Baker...
, Donovan
Donovan
Donovan Donovan Donovan (born Donovan Philips Leitch (born 10 May 1946) is a Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist. Emerging from the British folk scene, he developed an eclectic and distinctive style that blended folk, jazz, pop, psychedelia, and world music...
, The Hollies
The Hollies
The Hollies are an English pop and rock group, formed in Manchester in the early 1960s, though most of the band members are from throughout East Lancashire. Known for their distinctive vocal harmony style, they became one of the leading British groups of the 1960s and 1970s...
and Jimi Hendrix
Jimi Hendrix
James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix was an American guitarist and singer-songwriter...
- Ferris was invited - as a style consultant and their personal photographer - to help create their public images. He was given an insider's access to the “Experience” that helped define the look of the 1960s and influence youth culture and lifestyles worldwide.
Early years
As a post World War II baby who grew up in Hastings, England in the 1950s, Ferris learned two things that would later affect his life - the first being the history of Hastings, which had been conquered by the Normans in 1066. This spawned an interest in this medieval period of history and young Karl would bicycle around Norman castles fantasizing about battles, knights, chivalry and heraldry. The second thing he learned was an appreciation of art, with some of his early paintings included in a show at the Hastings Museum. He later went on to study at Hastings College of Art, focusing on the Pre-Raphaelite style of painting which would later influence his psychedelic photography of the late 1960s.He was invited back to Liverpool
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
to see a new group - The Beatles - who were appearing at the Cavern Club and was introduced to them there. From that point, he was hooked on “Beat” music from which The Beatles took their name.
After his military service, Ferris immigrated to Vancouver, Canada working as an assistant there to master photographer Harry Nygard. From Nygard, Karl learned the skills of composition, form and texture. He also began an involvement in the “Beatnik” lifestyle and began hanging out in coffee bars, listening to poetry readings and the progressive jazz of such artists as Miles Davis
Miles Davis
Miles Dewey Davis III was an American jazz musician, trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. Widely considered one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century, Miles Davis was, with his musical groups, at the forefront of several major developments in jazz music, including bebop, cool jazz,...
, Herbie Hancock
Herbie Hancock
Herbert Jeffrey "Herbie" Hancock is an American pianist, bandleader and composer. As part of Miles Davis's "second great quintet," Hancock helped to redefine the role of a jazz rhythm section and was one of the primary architects of the "post-bop" sound...
, John Coltrane
John Coltrane
John William Coltrane was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career, Coltrane helped pioneer the use of modes in jazz and later was at the forefront of free jazz...
, Eric Dolphy
Eric Dolphy
Eric Allan Dolphy was an American jazz alto saxophonist, flutist, and bass clarinetist. On a few occasions he also played the clarinet and baritone saxophone. Dolphy was one of several multi-instrumentalists to gain prominence in the 1960s...
and Ornette Coleman
Ornette Coleman
Ornette Coleman is an American saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter and composer. He was one of the major innovators of the free jazz movement of the 1960s....
. He photographed his first music subjects at these gatherings for local newspapers and magazines. He also began to take fashion shots of girlfriends and models, building up a respectable portfolio. Nygard told him that he had a real talent in this area, but to further expand his portfolio, he should return to London where the “Mod” fashion scene was creating new opportunities in the world of arts, music and fashion.
In 1964 Karl returned to England and the “happening” Beat scene. Ferris received commissioned work as a fashion and cover photographer for teen magazines 19 and Petticoat and later for Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, French Mode and Marie Claire. These commissions brought him to such locations as Paris, Cannes, Munich, Ibiza and Morocco. When he wasn’t working he would join into the “Scene”, and after meeting (and eventually dating) Denmark’s top “superstar” model of the time (Maude Bertelsen), Karl was introduced to a Pop group called the “The King Bees” who invited him to sing cover versions of Rolling Stones songs with them, and so he began touring in and around Copenhagen with this group.
He eventually returned to England for a “fashion shoot” offer with Vogue. In 1966 The Beatles had just released “Rubber Soul
Rubber Soul
Rubber Soul is the sixth studio album by the English rock group The Beatles, released in December 1965. Produced by George Martin, Rubber Soul had been recorded in just over four weeks to make the Christmas market...
” and Karl had the chance to meet up with their official photographer, Robert Freeman
Robert Freeman
Robert Freeman, Rob Freeman, Bob Freeman or Bobby Freeman may refer to:-Religious scholars:*Robert Freeman , Scottish-born American missionary and Baptist minister active with YMCA in Europe during World War I; author of 1921 book The Land I Live In*Robert C...
, who encouraged Ferris to experiment with different styles of images - which he promptly did – and created his unique psychedelic style. That summer on a trip to the Spanish island of Ibiza
Ibiza
Ibiza or Eivissa is a Spanish island in the Mediterranean Sea 79 km off the coast of the city of Valencia in Spain. It is the third largest of the Balearic Islands, an autonomous community of Spain. With Formentera, it is one of the two Pine Islands or Pityuses. Its largest cities are Ibiza...
he discovered and began shooting the innovative psychedelic fashion work of designers Simon Posthuma and Marijke Koger – aka The Fool
The Fool (design collective)
The Fool were a Dutch design collective and band who were influential in the psychedelic style of art in British popular music in the late 1960s. The colourful art draws on many fantastical and mystical themes...
- and these photos were eventually printed in the fashion section of The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
. This was the first time such psychedelic photography and fashions had been seen anywhere. He and The Fool were then invited to come to London to shoot some more “Psychedelic” fashion features.
From this work, Ferris received many commissions. He also began working on “Psychedelic Happening shows” during which moving images of colored liquid and photographs were projected over freeform dancers. The likes of Paul McCartney
Paul McCartney
Sir James Paul McCartney, MBE, Hon RAM, FRCM is an English musician, singer-songwriter and composer. Formerly of The Beatles and Wings , McCartney is listed in Guinness World Records as the "most successful musician and composer in popular music history", with 60 gold discs and sales of 100...
, Graham Nash
Graham Nash
Graham William Nash, OBE is an English singer-songwriter known for his light tenor vocals and for his songwriting contributions with the British pop group The Hollies, and with the folk-rock band Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Nash is a photography collector and a published photographer...
, Eric Clapton
Eric Clapton
Eric Patrick Clapton, CBE, is an English guitarist and singer-songwriter. Clapton is the only three-time inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: once as a solo artist, and separately as a member of The Yardbirds and Cream. Clapton has been referred to as one of the most important and...
, T Rex, Pink Floyd
Pink Floyd
Pink Floyd were an English rock band that achieved worldwide success with their progressive and psychedelic rock music. Their work is marked by the use of philosophical lyrics, sonic experimentation, innovative album art, and elaborate live shows. Pink Floyd are one of the most commercially...
and John Lennon
John Lennon
John Winston Lennon, MBE was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founding members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music...
dropped by and began participating - by playing music - with these shows. In 1966, Ferris was also invited to do a stage "Liquid light show" for Pink Floyd, which is believed to be one of the first ever done in England.
Ferris meets Jimi Hendrix
Ferris was introduced to singer/guitarist Jimi HendrixJimi Hendrix
James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix was an American guitarist and singer-songwriter...
in 1967 through musician/producer Chas Chandler
Chas Chandler
Bryan James "Chas" Chandler was an English musician, record producer and manager of several successful music acts....
, who had “discovered” Hendrix. Karl received the compliment of a lifetime when Hendrix remarked to him, on seeing his portfolio, “You‘re doing with photography what I’m doing with music - going far out beyond the limits and blowing minds”. Hendrix then asked Ferris to be his photographer and to re-shoot the cover for the UK version of his album “Are You Experienced
Are You Experienced
Are You Experienced is the debut album by English/American rock band The Jimi Hendrix Experience. Released in 1967, it was the first LP for Track Records...
” – which he was unhappy with - for the US market. Hendrix said he wanted “something psychedelic to blow the minds of the fans” and that represented his music and style.
And so Ferris began experimenting, using a giant Nikon fisheye lens and a secret Infrared film that had just been released by the military, who had used it for U2 plane spying. This film was given to him by Kodak London who had seen his color experiments going through their Lab. The manager asked Karl if he could find some way to use the Infrared film commercially, so he started using it on Fashion and Rock shoots. Kodak was so please with the results that they gave Karl his first exhibit in their London gallery. Out of this experimentation came the famous “fisheye” photograph used for Jimi’s first US record album cover, which he also designed. His images then appeared on all three US "Experience" album covers released during Hendrix’s short life - “Are You Experienced?”, “Axis Bold As Love”, “Electric Ladyland
Electric Ladyland
Electric Ladyland is the third and final album of new material by the Jimi Hendrix Experience, released in October 1968 on Reprise Records, catalogue 2RS 6307. It is the only Hendrix studio album professionally produced under his supervision. It topped the Billboard 200 album chart for two weeks in...
” and the Japanese "Smash Hits
Smash Hits
Smash Hits was a pop music based magazine, aimed at teenagers and young adults and originally published in the United Kingdom by EMAP. It ran from 1978 to 2006 and was issued fortnightly for most of that time...
".
Karl went on to create the album cover images for Donovan
Donovan
Donovan Donovan Donovan (born Donovan Philips Leitch (born 10 May 1946) is a Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist. Emerging from the British folk scene, he developed an eclectic and distinctive style that blended folk, jazz, pop, psychedelia, and world music...
’s “Gift From A Flower To A Garden”, “Wear Your Love Like Heaven
Wear Your Love Like Heaven
"Wear Your Love Like Heaven" is a song and US-single by Donovan, released in 1967. It became the opening title of his double album A Gift from a Flower to a Garden...
”, “For The Little Ones” and “Hurdy Gurdy Donovan E.P.” and (again, partnering with The Fool) for The Hollies'
The Hollies
The Hollies are an English pop and rock group, formed in Manchester in the early 1960s, though most of the band members are from throughout East Lancashire. Known for their distinctive vocal harmony style, they became one of the leading British groups of the 1960s and 1970s...
“Evolution
Evolution
Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...
”. He was also instrumental in creating their overall looks for the shoots, which then became their recognized public images. During the years 1967-69, Karl Ferris was one of the preferred photographers to the British rock elite, shooting also many publicity photos for them. He was called "The Icon with the Nikon" by the musicians and Press back then.
In 1968, Ferris accompanied Donovan on his U.S. tour and was commissioned by LOOK Magazine
LOOK Magazine
LOOK Magazine is a quarterly publication in the United States. LOOK stands for Love Of Our Kind. Its target audience is African-American urban college students....
to shoot a feature article on Donovan, after which he was retained as a 'Stringer' in Europe to shoot images for music articles there. In 1969, Karl's Donovan psychedelic shots were featured in an article in TWEN, the famous German art magazine.
1970’s through 2000
Karl left London with his pregnant wife Anke in 1970 and went to live in IbizaIbiza
Ibiza or Eivissa is a Spanish island in the Mediterranean Sea 79 km off the coast of the city of Valencia in Spain. It is the third largest of the Balearic Islands, an autonomous community of Spain. With Formentera, it is one of the two Pine Islands or Pityuses. Its largest cities are Ibiza...
to bring up their son Lorien in that idyllic setting. Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell, CC is a Canadian musician, singer songwriter, and painter. Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in her native Saskatchewan and Western Canada and then busking in the streets and dives of Toronto...
visited Karl in Ibiza in 1970 on the recommendation of Graham Nash
Graham Nash
Graham William Nash, OBE is an English singer-songwriter known for his light tenor vocals and for his songwriting contributions with the British pop group The Hollies, and with the folk-rock band Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Nash is a photography collector and a published photographer...
and was photographed by Ferris. Karl continued shooting fashion and glamour photographs for magazines in Europe and the USA. In 1980, Ferris received a commission from Playboy Magazine to photograph "Welcome Back Kotter" star Melonie Haller
Melonie Haller
Melonie Haller is an American actress known for her role as Angie Globagoski on the television comedy series Welcome Back, Kotter during its third season . Before Kotter, Haller had small uncredited roles in The Love Machine and The French Connection, both 1971...
(John Travolta
John Travolta
John Joseph Travolta is an American actor, dancer and singer. Travolta first became known in the 1970s, after appearing on the television series Welcome Back, Kotter and starring in the box office successes Saturday Night Fever and Grease...
's love interest and the only female “Sweathog”) for a "Celebrity Pictorial" in the famous Bo Derek
Bo Derek
Mary Cathleen Collins , better known as Bo Derek, is an American film and television actress, model, and sex symbol, known for her role as Jenny Hanley in the 1979 comedy film 10. However, Derek's film career soon faltered; her later films, including, Bolero and Ghosts Can't Do It , were poorly...
issue. In 1983, Karl married Melonie and they went to live in Hampstead, London near Karl's original 60's studio. In 1984, a daughter Melissa was born in London, and during this time in the U.K., Karl worked shooting glamour and nude photos for Oui, Club and the Raymond Revue. In 1990, Karl was commissioned by Playboy in the Netherlands and Germany to shoot glamour layouts for them. Later, in 1995, Karl and Melonie returned to the U.S. and lived in the New York area, where Melonie Haller-Ferris took on various acting rolls in film and television.
2000 to present
In 2000, Ferris returned once again to the Vancouver, Canada area and established his new studio and publishing company there. Working alongside with famed illustrator Bob MasseBob Masse
Bob Masse is from Canada's west coast and has been producing concert posters since the 1960s. While attending art school in Vancouver, British Columbia, he began his career doing posters for the folk acts that came through town, in exchange for free drinks, tickets, and the opportunity to meet the...
, Karl’s best-known works have been reproduced in a new series of posters and fine art prints that recreated promotional posters of many of the events that Ferris had photographed in the 60’s at such iconic London concert venues as the Royal Albert Hall
Royal Albert Hall
The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall situated on the northern edge of the South Kensington area, in the City of Westminster, London, England, best known for holding the annual summer Proms concerts since 1941....
and Saville Theatre
Saville Theatre
The Saville Theatre is a former West End theatre at 135 Shaftesbury Avenue in the City of Westminster. The theatre opened in 1931, and became a music venue during the 1960s, finally being converted to a cinema in 1970.-Theatre years:...
and featuring acts such as Cream
Cream (band)
Cream were a 1960s British rock supergroup consisting of bassist/vocalist Jack Bruce, guitarist/vocalist Eric Clapton, and drummer Ginger Baker...
, the Jimi Hendrix Experience and Donovan. Also in 2000, Karl was commissioned to supply three of his original 1967 Hendrix photographs for cover and inside booklet of the ultra-premium "The Jimi Hendrix Experience
The Jimi Hendrix Experience
The Jimi Hendrix Experience were an English-American psychedelic rock band that formed in London in October 1966. Comprising eponymous singer-songwriter and guitarist Jimi Hendrix, bassist and backing vocalist Noel Redding and drummer Mitch Mitchell, the band was active until June 1969, in which...
" box set.
In 2003 Ferris began his quest to revisit a time in music that defined a generation with “The Ferris Experience Happening”. Exhibiting his famous record album cover photographs and a psychedelic multimedia video and slide show, the first of these “Happenings” opened in Vancouver, Canada at The Exhibitions Gallery. It was be the first time in 35 years that such an exhibition had been staged.
In 2005, Karl’s Happening show and photo gallery exhibit began a tour of major cities in the U.S., starting with the San Francisco Art Exchange and continuing in Toronto and other cities in 2006. Also that year, Karl was asked by the Hip-Hop group Sweatshop Union
Sweatshop Union
Sweatshop Union is a Canadian hip hop collective formed in 2000 when four politically minded rap acts—Dirty Circus, Pigeon Hole, Kyprios and Innocent Bystander —came together "to create a powerful, distinctive voice", and to produce their first album, which was published in 2001.Known for an...
to shoot and design the album cover for their record titled United We Fall. They admired his “60s-style” approach to photography and wanted something “Beatle-esque” for their new album’s cover image.
In 2006, a feature film documentary called "Revolution" went into production (to coincide with the 40th anniversary of "the Summer of Love"). Also in 2006, Karl's film company Helixus Productions started to film a feature documentary and mini-series called "Revolution - The Cultural Revolt of the Sixties and its Continuing Legacy” which explores the origin, flowering and long-term influence of psychedelia, a subculture that in the 1960s achieved a mass influence.. This film includes over 100 interviews with many of the era’s key innovators and will show how revolutionary new art forms were created as an expression of the counterculture and utilized as a tool for tearing down the existing establishment. A sample of interviews included: musicians Donovan
Donovan
Donovan Donovan Donovan (born Donovan Philips Leitch (born 10 May 1946) is a Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist. Emerging from the British folk scene, he developed an eclectic and distinctive style that blended folk, jazz, pop, psychedelia, and world music...
, Mick Fleetwood
Mick Fleetwood
Michael John Kells "Mick" Fleetwood is a British musician and actor best known for his role as the drummer and namesake of the blues/rock and roll band Fleetwood Mac. His surname, combined with that of John McVie, was the inspiration for the name of the originally Peter Green-led Fleetwood Mac...
(Fleetwood Mac), Willie Nelson
Willie Nelson
Willie Hugh Nelson is an American country music singer-songwriter, as well as an author, poet, actor, and activist. The critical success of the album Shotgun Willie , combined with the critical and commercial success of Red Headed Stranger and Stardust , made Nelson one of the most recognized...
, Paul Kantner
Paul Kantner
Paul Lorin Kantner is an American rock musician, known for co-founding the psychedelic rock band Jefferson Airplane and its spin-off band Jefferson Starship.- Overview :...
(Jefferson Airplane), Keith Emerson
Keith Emerson
Keith Noel Emerson is an English keyboard player and composer. Formerly a member of the Keith Emerson Trio, John Brown's Bodies, The T-Bones, V.I.P.s, P.P. Arnold's backing band, and The Nice , he was a founder of Emerson, Lake & Palmer , one of the early supergroups, in 1970...
, John Densmore
John Densmore
John Paul Densmore is an American musician and songwriter. He is best known as the drummer of the rock group The Doors.-Early life and The Doors:Born in Los Angeles, Densmore attended Santa Monica City College and Cal...
(Doors), Patrick Simmons
Patrick Simmons
Patrick Simmons is an American musician best known as a guitarist and vocalist for the rock band The Doobie Brothers. His fingerstyle guitar playing complements the strumming style of Tom Johnston. Born in Aberdeen, Washington, he has been the band's only consistent member throughout their tenure...
(Doobie Brothers) George Hunter
George Hunter
George Hunter may refer to:* George Hunter , Canadian journalistic photographer* George Hunter , businessman and philanthropist who made his fortune bottling Coca-Cola* George Hunter...
(Charlatans) and Mickey Jones
Mickey Jones
Mickey Jones is an American musician and actor.-Early life:Jones was born in Houston, Texas, the son of Frances Marie and Fred Edward Jones...
(Dylan's 1st Electric Band), Woodstock MC Wavy Gravy
Wavy Gravy
Wavy Gravy is an American entertainer and activist for peace, best known for his hippie appearance, personality and beliefs. His moniker...
.
designers Alan Aldridge
Alan Aldridge
Alan Aldridge is an English artist, graphic designer and illustrator.-Personal life:Born in 1943 in east London, he currently resides in Los Angeles...
(Beatles), Storm Thorgerson
Storm Thorgerson
Storm Thorgerson is an English graphic designer, known for his work for rock bands such as Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, 10cc, Dream Theater, The Mars Volta, Muse, The Cranberries, and Biffy Clyro.-Biography:...
(Pink Floyd), Alton Kelley, Stanley Mouse
Stanley Mouse
Stanley George Miller , better known as Mouse and Stanley Mouse, is an American artist, notable for his 1960s psychedelic rock concert poster designs and Grateful Dead album cover art.-Early life:...
(Grateful Dead), Klaus Voorman (Beatles), John Van Hamersveld
John Van Hamersveld
John Van Hamersveld is an American graphic artist and illustrator who designed record jackets for pop and psychedelic bands, since the 1960s...
and The Fool
The Fool (design collective)
The Fool were a Dutch design collective and band who were influential in the psychedelic style of art in British popular music in the late 1960s. The colourful art draws on many fantastical and mystical themes...
(Simon and Marjke), models Patti Boyd and Charlotte Martin, Jenny Boyd
Jenny Boyd
Helen Mary Boyd is a former 1960s London fashion model. She is also the younger sister of Pattie Boyd, who married Beatle George Harrison....
, actor/activist Peter Coyote
Peter Coyote
Peter Coyote is an American actor, author, director, screenwriter and narrator of films, theatre, television and audio books. His voice work includes narrating the opening ceremony of the 2002 Winter Olympics and Apple's iPad campaign. He has also served as on-camera co-host of the 2000 Oscar...
, “Summer of Love
Summer of Love
The Summer of Love was a social phenomenon that occurred during the summer of 1967, when as many as 100,000 people converged on the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood of San Francisco, creating a cultural and political rebellion...
” exhibit curator Christoph Grunenberg, photographers Astrid Kirchherr
Astrid Kirchherr
Astrid Kirchherr is a German photographer and artist and is well known for her association with The Beatles and her photographs of The Beatles during their Hamburg days....
(Beatles-Hamburg), Bob Seidemann
Bob Seidemann
Bob Seidemann is an American graphic artist and photographer best known for the creation of several album covers and portraits of musicians in the 1960s and 1970s.Seidemann first gained notoriety in 1967 for a photographic interpretation of the Pietà...
, Gered Mankowitz
Gered Mankowitz
Gered Mankowitz is a British photographer of the rock music scene over the last 40 years. Some of his portraits of rock musicians, such as The Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix and Slade, are now part of the permanent collection of the National Portrait Gallery.-Personal life:His father was the late...
(Rolling Stones), Bob Whitaker (Beatles) and Herb Worthington (Fleetwood Mac)and many others,
The documentary is a serious investigation of the phenomenon and long-term impact of this cultural shift. In addition to the featured interviews, the film will also include music, period stock footage and current footage of locations of many of the events covered in the film (as well as many psychedelic images which are used as transitions). The film is scheduled to be released in early 2010.
In 2009, a book "The Karl Ferris Psychedelic Experience" of his Psychedelic Hendrix, Donovan, Cream, Fool and Fashion photographs (including a DVD Slide show screensaver) will be published.
Karl is also producing a Trilogy of feature films based on the biography and influence of the 15th century father of Surrealism Hieronymus Bosch. Of which he is also a Writer, Producer, Director and Art Director.
Currently a TV documentary on Karl's work and life "The Karl Ferris Experience" is being finished.
External links
- Artist's film "Revolution" Sixties documentary web site
- “The Karl Ferris Experience” on YouTube
- Interview article about “the making of” the cover for Jimi Hendrix’s “Are You Experienced?”
- Interview with Karl Ferris about the making of The Hollies "Evolution" Album cover
- Magazine article
- Magazine article
- Magazine article
- Vancouver Courier
- Magazine article
- AOL video
- Artist's website