KEVIN CUMMINS: In His Own Words

Born and raised in Manchester, Cummins’ native city proved to be a fertile ground for his lens. Photographing the iconoclastic punk scene in the late ‘70s, Cummins quickly became a key figure in the documentation of British music in this time, working as a founding contributor to The Face and his own publication, City Life. As Chief Photographer for The New Musical Express for 10 years, Cummins captured legendary acts at the beginning of their ascent to global stardom. From Oasis and Joy Division to Bjork and Courtney Love, his work is recognised the world over for its captivating and candid depictions of beloved artists. Ahead of the launch of the END. x adidas SPZL “By the Sea” collaboration, shot by Cummins, the photographer shared an insight into his most revered work.

On discussing his relationship with adidas SPZL, Kevin said "I’m  really proud of the work I've done with Gary over the years. Working on the Spezial range is  a really satisfying period in my professional career. It’s great that so many collectors of Spezial appreciate the photos too. I love the brand and I always look forward to the next one, knowing there will always be pieces that I’m proud to wear. Gary does an amazing job each year with Spezial. Long may it continue".

Gary, meanwhile, very much reciprocates the respect and admiration, commenting “In the very early days of SPZL, I picked the phone up and spoke to Kevin Cummins about us working together. I already had a relationship with Kevin, I had a number of his photographs on my wall, because he photographed pretty much all of my favourite bands. He photographed everybody from the Happy Mondays, The Stone Roses, Joy Division and New Order, through to Bowie, Bob Marley and the Sex Pistols. I already knew Kevin and was a fan of his work, so when I got the greenlight to work on adidas SPZL, I picked the phone up and said, “look, I know you’re not a fashion photographer, but I think it would be great if we could take some photographs of people who I’ve got relationships with, who support what I’m doing”. Kevin’s philosophy for the way he works as a photographer is he doesn’t turn up with a big set up or loads of assistants, it’s just him and his camera, and his philosophy is if he doesn’t get the shot in the first five minutes, he’ll never get the shot. Because he works as a music photographer, he could work in an incredibly stealthy way. So, the first couple of seasons I remember we’d show up at Don Letts’ house, and we’d say, “we want to get a couple of photos of you Don, can you wear this tracksuit?”. So we shot a whole bunch of musicians that I was a fan of, but then we started looking at it and thought “we’ve shot Don Letts, we’ve shot Bernard Sumner, we’ve shot Noel Gallagher, but they’re all over 50”, so then it was like, we need to add a younger element to this. One of the things they used to say to me in my early days at adidas was, “if in doubt, ask what Adi would’ve done”, and to Adi Dassler, the sports person, the athlete, was always the ultimate. So then I started speaking to adidas sports marketing about shooting some of the football players, so in the early days we shot Lukas Podolski and that, in a way, set the foundations for some of the stuff we did further down the line, when we shot the likes of Luke Shaw and Kieran Tierney.

It always has to feel right, and a lot of what we do with SPZL is instinctive. You know, those early shots we did with Kevin were very spontaneous and off the cuff, and, in a way, quite guerilla, as we weren’t turning up there with cheques or contracts or any of that stuff, it was literally just a simple phone call. But in a way, what that did was create the foundations for what we did further down the line, where we created films using football players or musicians. So yeah, Kevin’s work has been very important, and he also has a really good working relationship with Nick Griffiths, so when we are making the SPZL films, nobody knows Kevin is even there, he kind of ghosts around and then, at the end of the day, he appears will of these great photographs. His style and philosophy of working is perfect for SPZL, and there’s a lot to be said for working with longstanding relationships, instead of flittering around and trying to jump on the latest, hippest thing. Kevin’s CV and his work really speaks for itself.".