31 May 2016
DAVID KING
David King, who supervised the artwork for THE WHO SELL OUT, died on 11 May 2016 of a heart attack.
He was an immensely amusing and inspiring man to work with, though Roger may not agree – I think he got a chill from sitting in baked beans for an hour.
What many people will not know – and I found out when I was working as an editor at Faber & Faber – is that David was an assiduous archivist of Soviet popular and political art, posters, polemic and even poetry and fiction. We planned a few books together at one point, especially one about Vladimir Mayakovsky who was an artist and political agitator – someone who inspired much of the rebellious agitation in the UK during the later hippy days. David had encyclopaedic knowledge of the Soviet era in the ‘20s.
So I saw both sides of the man, and I merely wish here to pay my respects. Who fans will be surprised to know that the fellow who squeezed a monster MEDAC pimple cream onto Keith Moon’s face was such a serious and dedicated archivist and commentator.