John Lennon | Bag One

John Lennon
Bag One
New York City, USA: Cinnamon Press, 1970
76.2 x 58.4 cm.
Edition of 300 signed and numbered copies [+ 45 hors commerce]

Anthony Fawcett met John Lennon and Yoko Ono when he was working at the Robert Fraser Gallery, and later assisted them with their Acorn Piece and Lennon's You Are Here. In February of 1969, he introduced Lennon to the technique of lithography and proposed that he produce a series of lithographs.

Ed Newman of Curwen press recalls "We just had everything in the corner of a room, so that whenever John felt like it, he could just do it. When he was inspired, he would work very quickly."

Lennon began work on a series of images using the technique, documenting his wedding and honeymoon. Aldo Crommylynck, Picasso's printer in Paris, produced trial prints which Lennon was reportedly pleased with, and arrangements were made to have the entire series produced in London. Fourteen images were selected and a fifteenth was written directly onto the zinc plate at the London printers in June of 1969.

Fashion designer Ted Lapidus (who is credited with creating 'unisex' fashions, and had previously made clothes for Lennon, Brigitte Bardot, Françoise Hardy, Twiggy and others) designed a white plastic zippered bag to house the prints. The name Bag One referred to Ono's Bag Piece, which the couple would sometimes perform in lieu of traditional interviews.

Lennon signed the 5145 prints during his stay at Ronnie Hawkins farm in Streetsville, Ontario, where Lennon and Ono stayed before the couple met with Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau.

A month later, in January 1970, the prints were presented in an exhibition at Eugene Schuster's London Arts Gallery at 22 New Bond Street. The portfolio was offered for £550, with individual prints priced at £40 each. Fifty sets and twenty individual prints sold at the opening.

Less than 24 hours later, the police raided the gallery and confiscated eight works on the grounds that they were obscene. The images featured Ono with her legs spread, Ono masturbating, and Lennon performing cunnilingus ("Sometimes I feel like going down" he sang on It's So Hard, the following year). In one image, a threesome is depicted, with what appears to be Ono and two Lennons.

Detective Inspector Frederick Luff, the head of Scotland Yard's obscene publications squad, said that the lithographs were "the work of a sick mind", but the Director of Public Prosecution declined to prosecute Lennon under the Obscene Publications Act 1964. He feared that the case would open the floodgates and that countless historical artworks depicting nude figures would become subject to censorship.

Instead, Lennon was prosecuted under the Metropolitan Police Act 1839, which prohibits the selling or distributing of "profane, indecent or obscene books, papers, prints, drawings, paintings or representations". In the trial that followed, Schuster cited the example of Picasso's erotic works, which had never been confiscated, and argued that Lennon was being singled out because of his fame.

On April 27, 1970, three weeks into the trial, the gallery won the case.

A planned sequel (Bag Two?) based on the I Ching, was never realized.

“Lennon’s sex life in the medium of lithography is a poignant comment on a modern society. In the last year Lennon has repeatedly attempted to identify himself as an artist beyond Pop music. It has brought ridicule on him and his efforts have been scorned.

The history of lithography has seen a change of emphasis from content to technique and Lennon has taken advantage of this movement to expose a society by exposing his own private life to encourage a more introspective commitment to content by today’s artists who can be so timid. In a society where movement and social change play such an important part, the artist’s need to experiment is not new. Warhol and Rauschenberg have created a pattern. John Lennon is developing this tradition and although he may not be making many friends, he has committed himself to a particular cultural leadership which has always been the position of the artist.”

- London Arts Gallery, press release