Jefferson Airplane Handbill
Wes Wilson was fascinated with the sensory aspects of San Francisco dance-concerts, and the globular forms of BG004 suggest the oozing shapes of a liquid light show or the curves of the back-up drum section. The concert featured the popular Jefferson Airplane, Quicksilver Messenger Service and blues great Lightnin' Hopkins.
The handbill was printed once before the concert in black ink on thin white paper. It measures 5 1/2" x 8 1/2".
When the Avalon Ballroom and Bill Graham's Fillmore Auditorium began to hold weekly dance concerts, Wilson was called upon to design the posters. He created psychedelic posters from February 1966 to May 1967, when disputes over money severed his connection with Graham. Wilson pioneered the psychedelic rock poster. Intended for a particular audience, "one that was tuned in to the psychedelic experience," his art, and especially the exaggerated freehand lettering, emerged from Wilson's own involvement with that experience and the psychedelic art of light shows.