![\"Punk](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1779099381_495_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\nThe best way to incite a riot at a rock club? Start talking about when \u2014 exactly \u2014 the style of music was born. The same holds doubly true for punk. The hectic, electrified, primal scream of a genre can be traced to the 1960s, but really came alive in the \u201870s.<\/p>\n
Some fans say the music exploded in \u201977 with the release of \u201cNever Mind the Bollocks, Here\u2019s the Sex Pistols\u201d \u2014 the first and only album by London\u2019s de facto face of punk.<\/p>\n
According to the Skirball Cultural Center\u2019s new exhibition, \u201cOutsiders, Outcasts, Rebels + Weirdos: Punk Culture 1976-86,\u201d which opens Wednesday, punk\u2019s year zero was 1976, when the Ramones debuted their self-titled record. That same year, the Sex Pistols cursed on live TV, John Holmstrom and Legs McNeil co-founded Punk magazine, and the Damned released the first British punk single, \u201cNew Rose.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Skirball\u2019s exhibit arrives as punk commemoration is in the air, with 50th anniversary celebrations and tie-ins happening across the country, including the Sex Pistols\u2019 upcoming tour.<\/p>\n
\u201cOutsiders, Outcasts, Rebels + Weirdos\u201d doesn\u2019t dwell on who invented what and when. Instead, its collection of photographs, fliers, posters, clothing and pins explore how punk evolved over a decade, spreading from New York to the UK, and then on to the West Coast, with an emphasis on L.A.\u2019s contributions. It also explores the little-known history of the genre\u2019s Jewish musicians and icons.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s hard to create a periodization in a cultural moment,\u201d says museum chief curator Cate Thurston. \u201cIt\u2019s always gonna be messy and we\u2019re gonna miss things. But what we liked about 1976 is that it coincides with the release of the Ramones\u2019 first album. And it\u2019s a moment when punk gains broader attention.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe use the name \u2018punk\u2019 and attach it to expression and rebellion,\u201d adds co-curator Michael Worthington, a graphic design professor at CalArts. \u201cBut it shifts through time and locations. It means different things to different people. We\u2019re interested in that rolling trajectory, rather than trying to pin it down in a definitive way.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Punk posters are a big part of the Skirball exhibition, \u201cOutsiders, Outcasts, Rebels + Weirdos: Punk Culture 1976-86,\u201d which traces the rise of punk from the UK to L.A.<\/p>\n
(Carlin Stiehl \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n
London-based photographer Sheila Rock\u2019s life-size image of the Ramones at the Hammersmith Odeon in 1978 is the first to greet visitors. From there, nearly 400 fliers and posters guide guests both geographically and chronologically, beginning with punk\u2019s pre-1976 years. Before it had a name, punk was influenced by glam rock singers and experimental garage rock bands like David Bowie, Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground, the MC5, the New York Dolls, and Iggy Pop and the Stooges.<\/p>\n
Even traditional wall text has been replaced by informational sheets resembling fliers that visitors can grab from dispensers throughout the galleries.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe show is primarily communicated through fliers,\u201d says Thurston. \u201cThere are no reproductions. So you\u2019ll see ripped corners and tape here and there.\u201d<\/p>\n
The idea is to show ephemera that is beaten and weathered, says Worthington. \u201cThings that really look like they\u2019re of that period. We like that authenticity. We\u2019re not trying to show perfect pieces.\u201d<\/p>\n
Many of the artists featured in the show appear on the illustrated covers of Punk, which are part of N.Y.-based collector Andrew Krivine\u2019s massive trove of music memorabilia. Other bands like the Talking Heads, the Weirdos, the Heartbreakers, Television, and Richard Hell and the Voidoids appear on ads for gigs at legendary venues including CBGB and Max\u2019s Kansas City.<\/p>\n
While N.Y. punk was inspired by Beat writers and intellectuals, its British counterpart was more sociopolitical, aggressive and nihilistic, addressing concerns about the government, the monarchy and unemployment. Band members were art school students and dropouts, like Glen Matlock from the Sex Pistols and Joe Strummer and Mick Jones from the Clash.<\/p>\n
![\"Punk](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1779099383_173_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Punk shirts from various designers are displayed on a wall at the Skirball exhibition \u201cOutsiders, Outcasts, Rebels + Weirdos: Punk Culture 1976-86.\u201d The popularity of punk fashion contributed to the global rise of the punk movement.<\/p>\n
(Carlin Stiehl \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n
Punk fashion played a dominant role on both scenes and is an exhibition highlight. Some showstopping pieces were sold at Vivienne Westwood\u2019s London shop Seditionaries, which revolutionized a rough-and-ready pop-culture style that still resonates to this day. Other pieces are on loan from British graphic designer Malcolm Garrett\u2019s collection at Manchester Metropolitan University. Tattered sweaters, linen T-shirts, parachute shirts and \u201cbondage suits\u201d are printed with slogans that read \u201cOnly anarchists are pretty\u201d and \u201cAnarchist punk gang.\u201d<\/p>\n
The global power of UK fashion helped turn punk into a commercial movement, but by the late 1970s the scene had moved to L.A. where it looked much different. Here, punk bands truly espoused the music\u2019s DIY ethos, and were more culturally diverse.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn L.A., nobody had record deals,\u201d says Worthington. \u201cNobody had any money. People are finding these crazy venues to play. So we see this shift in DIY and homemade, and often the deliberate non-adoption of the mainstream. These people had no rules. They\u2019re making their own records. They\u2019re making their own clothing.\u201d<\/p>\n
This was in stark contrast to the immediate commodification of the London scene, he said, noting that in L.A. artists were working in their own way, and on their own terms. If you weren\u2019t part of the scene, you probably didn\u2019t know about it. There was no internet, no press coverage. Bands had to create their own vehicles of dissemination.<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1779099384_201_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
A map of L.A. punk clubs is displayed at the Skirball exhibition \u201cOutsiders, Outcasts, Rebels + Weirdos: Punk Culture 1976-86.\u201d Clubs, including the Masque, played a huge role in the scene during the late 1970s.<\/p>\n
(Carlin Stiehl \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n
Another exhibit standout is a wall that maps L.A.\u2019s bygone punk clubs like the Starwood, the Masque, Club Lingerie and Madame Wong\u2019s, which stretched from Hollywood to Beverly Hills to East L.A. and Chinatown.<\/p>\n
Within the geographical and chronological categories are thematic sections dedicated to punk\u2019s fight against fascism and racism, punk art and punk photography. One section is devoted to L.A.\u2019s artists Gary Panter and Raymond Pettibon, who created logos for the Screamers and Black Flag, respectively. Pettibon\u2019s stark four-bar design for the latter is one of punk\u2019s most iconic images, as recognizable as the Ramones\u2019 presidential seal and the Misfits\u2019 skeleton face.<\/p>\n
L.A. photographers are also featured, including Slash magazine co-founder Melanie Nissen and Ann Summa, whose archive is housed at UC Riverside\u2019s California Museum of Photography. Summa\u2019s 1982 snapshot of a stage diver at a Circle Jerks concert in Reseda is among the best examples of punk\u2019s live and chaotic energy.<\/p>\n
Jewish identity and culture are examined at length in the show, but were never overtly expressed in punk, the curators note. This is perhaps best exemplified by a quote from Tommy Ramone, whose parents survived the Holocaust and left Hungary after the Soviet invasion in the 1950s: \u201cPeople don\u2019t associate punk and Jews.\u201d<\/p>\n
The exhibition still ably singles out punk artists and groups with Jewish heritage like the Patti Smith Group, Blondie, Richard Hell, the Dictators and Suicide, as well as band managers, label executives, club owners and photographers who were part of the scene.<\/p>\n
These include Clash guitarist Jones, whose Jewish grandmother fled Russian pogroms; Clash manager Bernie Rhodes; music executive Seymour Stein, who signed the Ramones to Sire Records; photographer Bob Gruen; CBGB owner Hilly Kristal, who put punk on the American map and whose Jewish father also escaped Russian pogroms; and Sex Pistols\u2019 manager Malcolm McLaren, who was the grandson of Jewish diamond dealers.<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1779099386_654_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
A photo of two punks is displayed at the \u201cOutsiders, Outcasts, Rebels + Weirdos: Punk Culture 1976-86\u201d exhibition at the Skirball Cultural Center. The outsider movement was welcoming to all kinds of people from all walks of life.<\/p>\n
(Carlin Stiehl \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re not talking about Judaism, the religion, being punk,\u201d says Thurston. \u201cWe\u2019re talking about how Jews were drawn to punk. It\u2019s a story that people really don\u2019t think about. People don\u2019t think of themselves as Jewish punks at this time. They think of themselves as just punks.\u201d<\/p>\n
As a result, these artists were outsiders within an outsider community, Thurston explained, people who didn\u2019t quite fit into mainstream American culture or traditional Jewish life in America.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s sort of a neon razor blade story of the American dream \u2014 we didn\u2019t fit in anywhere, so we made a place for ourselves where we did fit in,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The curators\u2019 10-year timeline also embraces punk offshoots and subgenres, including post-punk, new wave and hardcore \u2014 particularly in Washington, D.C. \u2014 in addition to later bands like NOFX and Bad Religion, whose Jewish members picked up the baton after punk\u2019s first wave.<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1779099388_687_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Michael Worthington, co-curator of the exhibition \u201cOutsiders, Outcasts, Rebels + Weirdos: Punk Culture 1976-86,\u201d stands in front of West Coast punk posters.<\/p>\n
(Carlin Stiehl \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s so much stuff in the show, so many different bands represented, so much breadth of works,\u201d says Worthington. \u201cEven people who know a lot about this genre will discover something they didn\u2019t know. There\u2019s joy in that.\u201d<\/p>\n
There is also joy in reliving the past, Worthington said, and \u201chaving some kind of trigger to remembering your younger, more energetic, more rebellious, more idealistic self that I think we all lose as we get older.\u201d<\/p>\n
The connection between punk and the past is important, he said, because it takes people back to their formative years \u2014 to a time when they were still figuring out who they were and what they believed in.<\/p>\n