Description
When Texas-born singer Janis Joplin (1943–1970) joined the San Francisco band Big Brother and the Holding Company in 1966, she propelled the group to the top of the rock scene. A passionate, bluesy singer with a raw, powerful voice, Joplin electrified audiences with her sexualized performance style, delivered with explosive movements and wailing, whispering, and shrieking. One writer described her as a "mixture of Leadbelly, a steam engine, Calamity Jane, Bessie Smith, an oil derrick, and rot-gut bourbon." Before her 1970 death of a drug overdose at age twenty-seven, Joplin had become a female rock icon.The distinctive lettering and vivid colors of the psychedelic rock posters helped launch a poster collecting craze. As advertising images, portraits of film and music celebrities, and political propaganda wallpapered bedrooms and dorm rooms, the poster became a statement of one’s personal affiliations and a visual symbol of the era.
Image
Color Photolithographic Poster
National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; gift of Jack Banning
Record Contributed By
National Portrait GalleryRecord Harvested From
Smithsonian InstitutionKeywords
- Albin, Peter
- Andrew, Samuel
- Arranger
- Costume
- David Getz
- Entertainers
- Female
- Getz, David
- Guitarist
- Gurley, James
- James Gurley
- Janis Joplin
- Jewelry
- Joplin, Janis
- Lofthouse, Patrick
- Male
- Musician
- Musicians
- Necklace
- Performer
- Performing Arts
- Peter Albin
- Portrait
- Portraits
- Poster
- Rock
- Rocks
- Samuel Andrew
- Singer
- Songwriter
- Weir, Tom
- Women