Paul Cook's 'Smoking Boy' T-Shirt

The 'Smoking Boy' T-shirt — the first Sex Pistols T-shirt ever produced, and one of the founding objects in the visual history of British punk. Malcolm McLaren conceived and made the design in March 1976, in a run of no more than forty examples, specifically to promote the newly-formed band. McLaren described it in an interview with writer Paul Gorman in 2006: "This was my first attempt at making a Sex Pistols T-shirt. I wanted to create something of a stir."

The source image was taken by McLaren from the underground publication Boys Express No. 4, purchased in a shop in Brixton in the winter of 1975–76. McLaren's stated rationale tied the provocative image directly to the band's name: "the way this boy stood with his cigarette could look like a smoking gun." Bernie Rhodes, then assisting McLaren and later to become manager of the Clash, was unable to print the shirt. McLaren turned instead to Glen Matlock — simultaneously an art student at St Martins College of Art and a Saturday shop assistant at SEX — who printed the run at the college; McLaren reportedly threatened to dismiss him from the shop if he refused. The design was subsequently used on a poster for the Sex Pistols' concert at the Chalet du Lac, Paris, in September 1976.

The present example was manufactured inside out — an inversion of conventional garment construction consistent with the anti-fashion logic Westwood and McLaren built into their garments across the SEX and Seditionaries periods. It passed directly from Paul Cook — drummer and founding member of the Sex Pistols, and one of only two members (alongside Steve Jones) present from the band's formation in Shepherd's Bush in 1975 through to their final shows — to the photographer and designer Trevor Key (10 July 1947 – 6 December 1995), who acquired it while working for Virgin Records in 1977. Key had formed Cooke Key Associates with Brian Cooke in 1976; the studio became the go-to design and photography operation for Virgin Records, and Key's credits for the band include the sleeve for Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols (Virgin Records, 1977) and The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle (Virgin Records, 1979).

A variant of the 'Smoking Boy' T-shirt is held in the permanent collection of the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

PROVENANCE:

Paul Cook, drummer, the Sex Pistols; thence to Trevor Key, photographer and designer, by direct acquisition in 1977; accompanied by a Certificate of Authenticity issued by Eddie Lock (COA No. 14120, 14 January 2020)