Ian Dickson
The Music Photo Gallery · Represented Photographer
100+ Works ·50+

Ian Dickson

B. British photographer · Rock Photography · 1970s–1980s ·50+
Ian Dickson
Portrait of the photographer
Biography

Ian Dickson is one of the most notable rock photographers of the 1970s. Ian was raised in a Scots shipbuilding town on Glasgow’s western border. In 1963—just as the Beatles found fame—his family moved to Newcastle upon Tyne in the north-east of England, where he caught the photography bug. A chance meeting with the manager of Newcastle’s leading concert venue in 1972 launched his lifelong career as a professional music photographer.

Ian’s work has been featured in Rolling Stone, Sounds, New Music Express, Q, and is on display as part of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s permanent collection. In 1994, a selection of his work was shown at the MTV Awards in Berlin, at the Brit Awards at Alexandra Palace and at the World Music Awards in Monte Carlo and Copenhagen.

Ian now lives with his wife Shoko, son Louis, and daughter Koyuki in the English south-coast seaside town of Brighton, where he is taking life at a more leisurely pace. He is concentrating on marketing his back catalog online and in galleries around the world—an exercise he regards as “phase two” of his rock music photography career.

Selected Press

In the press.

GQ

How the Ramones became punk pioneers

In 1974, four misfits formed a band whose blitzkrieg bop would make the music world sit up and listen. The Ramones’ dropout attitude and ferocious anthems made them icons and GQ was there in the front row. 1-2-3-4...

British Journal of Photography

New Exhibition Celebrates 40 Years Since the Birth of Punk

The exhibition comprises of 40 images taken by Ian Dickson and Kevin Cummins.
Each image documents the energy of the early years of the movement from 1976 to 1979 in cities  including London, Manchester, and Liverpool.
The exhibition, titledPhoto-punk: 40 Images From the Birth of Punk, captures the atmosphere of the scene through imagery of bands and their fans across the UK.