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When Keith Attended the Sidcup School of Art
Keith attended the Sidcup Schol of Art (later renamed Sidcup Art College) after being expelled from Dartford Technical School in 1959. His classmate Dick Taylor was there as well, and the two spent that period developing their early musical interests and creative ambitions side by side before their paths led them into rock history. “The society and everything I was growing up in was just too small for me…I knew I had to look for a way out…”, Richards once said.
About Keith Richards and the Sidcup Art School (from Keith’s biography Life)
“There was almost no ‘art’ to be had at Sidcup. After a while you got a drift of what you were being trained for and it wasn’t Leonardo da Vinci. Loads of flash little sons of bitches would come down in their bow ties from J. Walter Thompson or one of the other big advertisers for one day a week to take the piss out of the art school students and try and pick up the chicks. They’d lord it over us and you got taught how to advertise…I realise now we were getting some dilapidated tail end of a noble art-teaching tradition from the pre-war period… all thrown away on advertising Gilbey’s Gin.”
“At the end (of art school) your teacher says, ‘Well I think this is pretty good.’ and they send you off to J. Walter Thompson and you have an appointment, and by then, in a way you know what’s coming – three or four smarty-pants, with the usual bow ties. ‘Keith, is it? Nice to see you. Show us what you’ve got.’ And you lay the old folder out. ‘Hmmmm. I say, we’ve had a good look at this, Keith, and it does show some promise. By the way, do you make a good cup of tea?’ I said yes, but not for you…
…I walked off with my folio – it was green, I remember – and I dumped it in the garbage can when I got downstairs. That was my final attempt to join society on their terms…I didn’t have the patience or facility to be a hack in an advertising agency.”
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