Biggest band that ever lived': inside the Grateful Dead art show

"The Anthem of the Sun painting visually demonstrates the intense innovation that happened in the psychedelic revolution, when music was electrified and LSD became central to the burst of culture that defined the 1960s. The Grateful Dead encapsulated this spirit in their music and came to be considered the most American band of all time for being at the center of the psychedelic movement and its transition from the Beat generation that preceded it."

"Curated by psychedelic guru Brian Chambers, 60 Years of the Grateful Dead is a retrospective exhibition that opens at the Chambers Project in Grass Valley, California, on 6 December, two days after the 60th anniversary of the band's founding. It is the most comprehensive display of the original art from the band's artistic history to date. The visual vocabulary of the Dead was superior to other music groups, Chambers said. The Dead were a nexus and in San Francisco, there were always creatives surrounding them."

"Photograph: The Chambers Project, via Colin Day While the show is of museum quality, gathering the works was not a typical curatorial process. Chambers owned some of it, but had to track down other works in unexpected places. The Anthem of the Sun painting was in Walker's sister's garage in Sacramento, where it had been stowed"

Bill Walker met Phil Lesh as a student at Nevada Southern University and was invited in 1967 to make the cover for the Grateful Dead's second album, Anthem of the Sun. A subsequent LSD and ayahuasca trip in the Valley of Fire inspired Walker to paint Anthem of the Sun with figures encountered in the desert. The painting exemplifies the intense innovation of the psychedelic revolution, when music was electrified and LSD shaped 1960s culture. The Grateful Dead became emblematic of that movement and its transition from the Beat generation. Brian Chambers curated a retrospective, 60 Years of the Grateful Dead, opening 6 December at the Chambers Project, assembling original works from varied and unexpected sources.

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