Peter Pontiac’s illustration from Muziek Expres of Lou Reed. The small caption on the bottom right reads ‘Junkies Ain’t funky!’
Muziek Expres was an edgy and super popular Dutch music magazine that got its start back in the mid-50s. In addition to the regular kind of music magazine features like interviews with musicians and bands, the coveted fold-out posters and song lyrics, the magazine also showcased early glammy-looking illustrations done by a legendary Dutch illustrator known as “Peter Pontiac.”
David Bowie.
Born Peter J. G. Pollmann in the North Holland province of Beverwijk in 1951, Pollmann changed his name to “Pontiac” sometime in the 1960’s after meeting up with a group of creative type dropouts whose pastimes consisted of the ever popular trifecta of sex, dope, and rock and roll. During his time with these ne’er-do-well nomads, Pontiac (who had no formal training as an artist) was illustrating the covers of illegal songbooks for acts like Lou Reed and the Rollings Stones. Pontiac’s style came from his love of underground comics, especially the works of cartoonist and folk hero, R. Crumb.
Somewhere along the way, Pontiac’s artwork caught the eye of Rolling Stone bringing Pontiac notoriety on his home turf which led to his work being showcased in publications all over Holland, Spain, and the United States. In 1990, Pontiac launched his own comic zine, the Pontiac Review that would have a fourteen-year run. In 2000 Pontiac published what many residents of the Netherlands consider to be one of the greatest graphic novels to come out of their country, Kraut in which Pontiac relays the eerie story of his father, Joop Pollmann, a volunteer war correspondent for the SS during the Second World War who mysteriously disappeared while sailing off the coast of Curaçao.
In an interview conducted not long before his death in 2015 from liver disease, Pontiac expressed remorse when it came to his heroin days saying that if he could, that he would do things “differently” and referred to himself as a “victim of Lou Reed.” There are a few sources online if you’d like to own some of Pontiacs work, including the hard-to-track-down award-winning book Rhythm. Pontiac’s rock-star-studded illustrations from Muziek Expres follow. Some are mildly NSFW.
Freddie Mercury.
Mick Jagger.
George Harrison.
Roger Daltrey.
Jimi Hendrix.
Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull.
Rory Gallagher.
Keith Richards.
H/T: Lambiek
Previously on Dangerous Minds:
Amusing manga of The Cure, Siouxsie Sioux, Marc Bolan, Hanoi Rocks & more from the 80s