Jamie Hewlett and the aesthetics of pop culture

By D.B.

IN 1988 a publication launched in London that was not quite a comic, not quite a style magazine, not quite an art periodical and not quite a music paper, but a curious hybrid of all these things. Deadline was neither the first nor the last such bold experiment. It was, however, one of the few to flourish. Its success was largely based on one thing: the art of Jamie Hewlett, then aged 20, and already an accomplished and invigorating graphic artist. A book recently republished by Taschen, collecting more than 400 of his artworks, underlines his influence.

“Tank Girl”, co-created and illustrated by Mr Hewlett, was the new magazine’s first cover star. Its title character (pictured, below) was tough, unruly and violent, a creature of pure impulse. Shaven-headed, cigarette-chewing and dressed in combat gear and weaponry, she was both a sex symbol and an anti-heroine for the underground, relished equally by men and women in a way few female cartoon characters ever have been. Tank Girl was not there for the viewer’s pleasure. She was there for her own.