Jonathon Cooke, of Village Green (and formerly of Love) is the man whose artwork who has been blu-tacked up on far too many walls to count. He is the man behind the iconic artwork for the Fabric nightclub. As Bleep are now selling the exclusive and limited Fabric t-shirt range, we decided to speak to the man himself…

How did you start working with Fabric?
JC: I have been working with them since 2000. I used to work for a company called Blue Source, and I worked on the pitch for the identity of Fabric…. But we didn’t get it.

About 6 months later, I went to go see a friend DJ at Scala and I bumped into Keith from Fabric. He told me that he was gutted that he never asked us to do the flyers as he was unhappy with the people they had hired.

I said I would do it BUT on one condition. I wanted it to have nothing to do with club culture. I wanted an open brief… he said I could do whatever I want…

B: So what was your thinking behind the art direction then?
JC: At the time, the club scene was dominated by the whole swanky club and super-star DJ thing which I assumed Fabric would be like… Of course, it wasn’t. That’s why I wanted to do it. It became a way of expressing anything that I was into at the time. I wanted the artwork to become a part of Fabric. Fabric was such a big thing when it launched…

B: Do you see a connection between the music and the design?
JC: Techno was considered a bit of a dirty word at that time and didn’t really have a place on a big stage. They kind of changed that and stuck with it. At the time, I was very into techno. I liked that attitude and I wanted the flyers to have the same attitude and confidence, rather than a flyer having a… I don’t know… a starship landing on a moon or something like that.

Ive always been into the idea of nature and history and I liked the idea of a kid coming out a club and going through a pack of flyers and him opening up a Fabric flyer and seeing a Victorian woman on a bike rather than the usual gear. That image is going to blow his mind more than an image of a girl with a fluffy bra on.

B: Do any of the artworks created stand out for you as your favourites?
JC: I did some black and white self-portraits years ago. I had some drill bits in my teeth and made a hat out of the Financial Times. They had a real 1920s modernist feel to them… I’ve always been fond of those.

B: How much of a part do you think you have played in making Fabric as successful as it is?
JC: I always wind them up and tell the Fabric guys that I put the “Fab” in “Fabric”! (he laughs). I don’t think it is important, Im just glad that the artwork has made as much of an impact as the club has. People talk about the artwork just as much as the music.

Tags: fabric, Jonathon Cooke, Love, Village Green

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