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Hipgnosis were an English art design group, based in London, that specialised in creating album cover artwork for Rock music musicians and bands. Their commissions included work for Pink Floyd, Def Leppard, T. Rex, the Pretty Things, Black Sabbath, Wishbone Ash, UFO, 10cc, Bad Company, Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, Scorpions, the Nice, Paul McCartney & Wings, the Alan Parsons Project, Yes, Genesis, Peter Gabriel, Electric Light Orchestra, Rainbow, Styx and Al Stewart.
Hipgnosis consisted primarily of Cambridge natives Storm Thorgerson and Aubrey Powell, and later Peter Christopherson.The photodesigns of Hipgnosis The Goodbye look. Vermillion Hutchinson Publishing Group. 1982 The group dissolved in 1983, though Thorgerson worked on album designs until his death in 2013. Powell has worked with Paul McCartney and the Who in film and video production, and as the creative director for both Pink Floyd and their lead guitarist David Gilmour. Christopherson went on to produce music videos for many bands and shot some of the earliest promotional photography for the Sex Pistols, but worked primarily as an electronic musician in the bands Throbbing Gristle, Psychic TV and Coil until his death in 2010.
When first starting out, Powell and Thorgerson adopted their name from graffiti they found on the door to their apartment. Thorgerson said they liked the word, not only for punning on "hypnosis", but for possessing "a nice sense of contradiction, of an impossible co-existence, from Hip = new, cool, and groovy, and gnosis, relating to ancient learning."Thorgerson, S: Hipgnosis • Walk Away René, page 87. Paper Tiger, 1978.
Hipgnosis gained major international prominence in 1973 with their cover design for Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of the Moon. The final design was one of several versions prepared for the band to choose from, but according to drummer Nick Mason, the 'prism/pyramid' design was the immediate and unanimous choice. The record itself became one of the biggest-selling and longest-charting albums of all time, and the cover has since been hailed as one of the best of all time (VH1 rated it as No. 4 in 2003). After that, the firm became highly sought-after, and did many covers for high-profile bands and artists such as Led Zeppelin, Genesis, UFO, Black Sabbath, Peter Gabriel, the Alan Parsons Project, and Yes. They also designed the cover for a UK paperback edition of Douglas Adams's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (Adams would describe Thorgerson as "The best album designer in the world"), as well as the original UK hardcover edition of Norman Spinrad's Bug Jack Barron.
Peter Christopherson joined Hipgnosis as an assistant in 1974, and later became a full partner. The firm employed many assistants and other staff members over the years, including freelance designers and illustrators Richard Evans, George Hardie, and Richard Manning.
Hipgnosis did not have a set fee for designing an album cover but instead asked the artists to "pay what they thought it was worth". (2026). 9782354251307, Éditions Fetjaine / La Martinière. ISBN 9782354251307 (The italics are present in the original.) According to Thorgerson, this policy only occasionally backfired.
Hipgnosis covers were noted for their quirky humour, such as the cover for the Pink Floyd double-LP compilation A Nice Pair (1973), which featured an array of visual puns. Another example was the 1974 album There's the Rub for Wishbone Ash using a picture of a cricketer and ball.
Such humour once angered Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin, when Hipgnosis created a visual pun based on "(tennis) racquet"/"(noise) racket" for the 1973 album Houses of the Holy. Hipgnosis almost lost Led Zeppelin as a client as a result.
Another trademark was that many of their cover photos visually related to the album's lyrics, often depicting puns or double meanings of words in the album title. Since both Powell and Thorgerson were film students, they often used models and staged the photos in a highly theatrical manner. Hipgnosis covers rarely featured artists' photos on the outside, and most were in a gatefold cover format to provide ample space for their imagery.
Many of Hipgnosis's covers also featured pen and ink logos and illustrations designed to appear high-tech (often by graphic designer George Hardie), stickers, fancy inner sleeves, and other packaging bonuses. One of the extras created by Hipgnosis was the specially printed inner sleeve for Led Zeppelin's In Through the Out Door (1979) LP, which was black and white but turned to colour when dampened with water (tying in with the main cover's photographic theme).
| A Saucerful of Secrets | |
| A New Generation of Blues | |
| Genesis | |
| Till There Was You | |
| The Aynsley Dunbar Retaliation | |
| More | |
| The Gun | Gun Sight |
| To Samuel a Son | |
| Ummagumma | |
| Panama Limited Jug Band | |
| Town and Country | |
| You Can All Join In | |
| Horizons | |
| Atom Heart Mother | |
| Quatermass | |
| Parachute | |
| The Going's Easy | |
| The Madcap Laughs | |
| Five Bridges | |
| Toe Fat | |
| Cochise | |
| Picnic – A Breath of Fresh Air | |
| Indian Summer | |
| Love at First Sight | |
| Gravy Train | |
| Barrett | |
| Remains to Be Heard | |
| Ring of Hands | |
| King Progress | |
| Think Pink | |
| Handle With Care | |
| Electric Warrior | |
| Toe Fat 2 | |
| On the Shore | |
| Marvin, Welch & Farrar | |
| Elegy | |
| Meddle | |
| The Electric Light Orchestra | |
| House on the Hill | |
| Edgar Broughton Band | |
| Pilgrimage | |
| Tightly Knit | |
| Tear Gas | |
| Stackridge | |
| Oakdown Farm | |
| Master's Apprentices | |
| Changes | |
| The Piper at the Gates of Dawn (Italian reissue) | |
| Rory Gallagher | |
| Flash | |
| Argus | |
| Autumn '67 – Spring '68 | |
| Fumble | |
| Distant Light | |
| Prologue | |
| Inside Out | |
| Lunch | |
| Freeway Madness | |
| Obscured by Clouds | |
| Trilogy | |
| A Time of Change | |
| Meanwhile...Back at the World | |
| Glencoe | |
| Danta | |
| Romany | |
| Olivia | |
| Crying Laughing Loving Lying | |
| ELO 2 | |
| The Dark Side of the Moon | |
| Minstrel in Flight | |
| On the Third Day | |
| Oora | |
| Past, Present and Future | |
| In Deep | |
| Houses of the Holy | |
| You Can't Beat 'Em | |
| Lifemask | |
| Ashes Are Burning | |
| Wishbone Four | |
| Live Dates | |
| Out of Our Hands | |
| Music from Free Creek | |
| Thunderbox | |
| Rock 'n Roll Gypsies | |
| Amar Caballero | |
| A Nice Pair | |
| Public Foot the Roman | |
| Rockin' with Curly Leads | |
| Jab It in Yore Eye | |
| Uno | |
| The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway | |
| There's the Rub | |
| Rampant | |
| Turn of the Cards | |
| Valentine | |
| Somethin's Happening | |
| Flashes from the Archives of Oblivion | |
| Bad Company | |
| Fruity | |
| Poetry in Lotion | |
| Syd Barrett | |
| Sheet Music | |
| Silk Torpedo | |
| Phenomenon | |
| Mind Wave | |
| Hollies | |
| Desolation Boulevard | |
| Force It | |
| Savage Eye | |
| Wish You Were Here | |
| Straight Shooter | |
| Scheherazade and Other Stories | |
| HQ | |
| A Bunch of 45s | |
| The Greatest Show on Earth | |
| The Original Soundtrack | |
| S. F. Sorrow / Parachute, double reissue (UK version only) | |
| Modern Times | |
| Venus and Mars | |
| Alberto y Lost Trios Paranoias | |
| Cunning Stunts | |
| Wheelin 'n' Dealin | |
| First Starring Role | |
| Rush | |
| The Winkies | |
| Cordon Bleu | |
| Subtle as a Flying Mallet | |
| Specs Appeal | |
| Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap (International edition) | |
| To the Hilt | |
| Jump on It | |
| Heartburn | |
| Wings at the Speed of Sound | |
| Year of the Cat | |
| Tales of Mystery and Imagination | |
| Technical Ecstasy | |
| A Trick of the Tail | |
| How Dare You! | |
| The Song Remains the Same | |
| Presence | |
| Unorthodox Behaviour | |
| Wings over America | |
| Olias of Sunhillow | |
| Close Enough for Rock 'n' Roll | |
| No Heavy Petting | |
| New England | |
| Wind & Wuthering | |
| Stranger in the City | |
| Russian Roulette | |
| Front Page News | |
| Songwriter | |
| Lights Out | |
| I Robot | |
| Deceptive Bends | |
| Bullinamingvase | |
| Moroccan Roll | |
| Livestock | |
| Sammy Hagar | |
| The Early Years | |
| Musical Chairs | |
| Burnin' Sky | |
| Animals | |
| The Light Shines On | |
| Peter Gabriel (I) (aka "Car") | |
| Going for the One | |
| Mirror Stars | |
| Quark, Strangeness and Charm | |
| Deliverance | |
| Live! | |
| Deadlines | |
| Caught Live + 5 | |
| Thrillington | |
| Classic Ash | |
| 2870 | |
| Laughing in the Dark | |
| Drastic Plastic | |
| Wet Dream | |
| David Gilmour | |
| Pieces of Eight | |
| Wings Greatest | |
| Back to the Bars | |
| Go 2 | |
| Caravan to Midnight | |
| Tormato | |
| …And Then There Were Three… | |
| No Smoke Without Fire | |
| Peter Gabriel (II) (aka "Scratch") | |
| Time Passages | |
| Pyramid | |
| Never Say Die! | |
| A Song for All Seasons | |
| Cords | |
| Obsession | |
| Bloody Tourists | |
| Approved by the Motors (version 2)Version 1 of the album shows an image of all four members. This first cover was designed by Cooke_Key_Associates. After Ricky_Slaughter and Bram_Tchaikovsky left The Motors the album was reissued with a new cover. That new cover is designed by Hipgnosis. | |
| Zaragon | |
| Every 1's a Winner | |
| Nite Flights | |
| London Town | |
| Gerry Rafferty | |
| Vielleicht Bist Du Ein Clown? | |
| Strangers in the Night | |
| Lovedrive | |
| Eve | |
| Desolation Angels | |
| The Dukes | |
| Parlez-Vous English (as the Broughtons) | |
| Greatest Hits 1972–1978 | |
| In Through the Out Door | |
| Product | |
| Angel Station | |
| No More Fear of Flying | |
| Live Herald | |
| Freeze Frame | |
| Danger Money | |
| Mick Taylor | |
| Correlations | |
| Slide Away the Screen | |
| 20 Jazz Funk Greats | |
| Welcome to the Cruise | |
| Back to the Egg | |
| Games | |
| The Michael Schenker Group | |
| Cross Talk | |
| Do They Hurt? | |
| Smallcreep's Day | |
| Look Hear? | |
| Peter Gabriel (III) (aka "Melt") | |
| Animal Magnetism | |
| No Place to Run | |
| Caught in the Crossfire | |
| Just Testing | |
| Living in a Fantasy | |
| De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da | |
| Live Dates 2 | |
| The Wild, the Willing and the Innocent | |
| A Collection of Great Dance Songs | |
| Difficult to Cure | |
| Fictitious Sports | |
| Fun in Space | |
| High 'n' Dry | |
| Sakuban Oaisimashō | |
| Nip in the Bud | |
| Tilt | |
| 1984 | |
| Music Spoken Here | |
| Tug of War | |
| Straight Between the Eyes | |
| Eye in the Sky | |
| Rough Diamonds | |
| Coda | |
| Bent Out of Shape | |
| Voyager | |
| Prototype | Prototype |
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