Squaring the Circle (The Story of Hipgnosis)

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JasoV 06/21/2023 Great Music, Interesting Stories. See more Rodney M 06/21/2023 if you love 70's classic rock, this is a must see. a beautiful slice of 70's culture, represented by the people that lived through it and survived to tell the story. See more Cassy B 06/21/2023 What a gift of art and music history! I grew up on this music and looking at these covers not knowing what was behind them. Great telling of the creative genius and interpersonal relationships that delivered art in the most unique way! There were funny, sad and poignant stories aplenty! So glad to enjoy the theater showing. See more Mister Peaches 06/21/2023 The film was a quite good dive into the formation, work, and demise of Hipgnosis and featured great interviews with many surviving members of the bands they worked with, and a few personalities they didn't. I would've gone higher, except I got the feeling they didn't quite know how to end it. See more Kim 06/21/2023 Great documentary film!! Any child of the 70s, anyone interested in design or photography with regard to iconic album covers will love this story. Well done, interesting, exciting! A MUST SEE! See more Michael Antony A @RT48850580 06/22/2025 Mikey’s Film Review: Squaring The Circle (The Story Of Hipgnosis) (2023) Vinyl collectors and fans of Classic Rock will surely love this exceptional talking heads style documentary currently streaming on Amazon. Directed and filmed in striking black and white by famed Dutch photographer, music video creative Anton Corbijn (Depeche Mode, U2, Herbert Grönemeyr, Metallica…), it’s a fascinating insight into a unique artistic relationship and a body of work that will very likely never be matched - or seen again… Using archive footage, past and current interviews with founders Storm Thorgerson (who passed away in 2013) and Aubrey Powell (now 78), we discover the process and ocassionally elaborate (make that outrageously expensive!) path they took to create some of the most iconic LP art in the history of music. From their lowkey inception to their own ‘Rockstar’ emulating indulgences, between 1968 and 1983 Hipgnosis were THE go to creative team for album covers. At their peak, they were treat like ‘Rock Royalty’ and could demand a fee of £50,000 per work… Pink Floyd started the ball rolling and in quick succession Hipgnosis were soon taking commissions for Led Zeppelin, T. Rex, Black Sabbath, Wishbone Ash, UFO, Bad Company, AC/DC, Scorpions, The Nice, Paul McCartney & Wings, The Alan Parsons Project, Yes, Humble Pie, Genesis, Peter Gabriel, Electric Light Orchestra, Rainbow, Styx, Al Stewart, XTC and even Def Leppard… New interviewees include both fans of their work (Noel Gallagher) and those who were there and ocassionally a part of the creative process (Roger Waters, David Gilmour, Nick Mason, Jimmy Page, Paul McCartney, Peter Gabriel, Graham Gouldman). In the end they made loads of money… and they lost it too. They made some truly iconic images and they made some outlandish, ridiculous decisions. It worked because they were a brilliant contradiction of ideas in a time where an ‘anything goes’ attitude prevailed. Noel Gallagher suggests a reason why many of us still share an affection for their work: “It was an affordable art collection of the working class”… Maybe that’s true. Can you remember the last time you looked at a piece of art in an exhibition in the way that we once devoured and perused our album covers? Me neither… Mikey’s Film Rating: 4/5* See more Read all reviews

Squaring the Circle (The Story of Hipgnosis)

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