Jonathan Barnbrook

24/06/2026

With our band Fragile Self, it is a chance to create visual work in its purest form. Controlling the music and the graphics allows us to create a complete personal universe, where sound, image, language and object all come from the same emotional source. In doing so, we hope to connect with the audience on a more direct emotional level, not simply presenting the music, but allowing people to enter the world that created it.

Often, an album will have one central piece of typography: a new way of writing the name of the artist and the title to create maximum recognition, be it on the cover of the CD, on streaming platforms or on the inevitable merchandise. With OCD, we wanted to take this pattern recognition further. Each song has its own unique logo, its own sign for the emotional state expressed in the song. Rather than one identity imposed across the whole album, the typography mutates from track to track, becoming unstable, obsessive, fragile, controlled, broken or ecstatic, depending on the psychological space of the music.

All are custom-drawn typography: some developed from unseen type taken from the studio archive and reshaped for this project, others created completely anew. Together, they form a private visual language for the record, a set of emotional signs that give each song its own presence and psychological space.

More soon on different aspects of the OCD release.

06/06/2026

A large amount of time these days is taken up working on our music project, Fragile Self. It is a chance to create visual work in its purest form. Controlling the music as well as the visuals allows us to create a complete visual and aural universe.

We have just released a new album, OCD, available, you guessed it, only on CD. One of the greatest pleasures for us was thinking about and creating the print. Shown here is the limited edition version. Each one is handmade and contains two CDs: one with tracks 1 to 8, and the other, which is cut in half, contains the last track, ‘In Absentia’. It is, of course, unplayable, symbolising the loss that is the subject matter of the song.

The cover is vacuum formed to make the circular logo of the album title, OCD. There are cards, with the lyrics on one side and a detail of a face on the other. Each song has its own particular image. These cards are placed by hand, and when the vacuum forming happens, they are sealed in place to make up the shape of a face. Each cover is completely unique and individual. Also inside is a fold out poster and a tattoo sheet, with phrases based on the idea of skin as a barrier, further echoing the subject matter of the songs.

We really enjoyed making this edition. It allowed the physical object to carry the same ideas as the music. The sound, the words, the images and the way the object is made all become part of the seamless experience.

12/02/2026

Some images from the launch of the Bowie show ‘You’re Not Alone’ – we worked with them and the Bowie estate, creating the logos and imagery. These include the main logo (there are others with a similar concept which will be revealed later), which takes the typography from various periods of Bowie’s creative life. And yes I am some of you can guess exactly where each piece of lettering is from.

The emphasis for the images, in contrast, was very much on ‘performance’. This is a show about Bowie in his own words, featuring a huge range of his creative output, but there are also some incredibly recreated live performances. Last night they played ‘Rock ’n’ Roll Suicide’ from the last Ziggy Stardust gig at the Hammersmith Odeon in 1973, a line of which is used for the show’s title. It is almost impossible to match the excitement of a live gig on film, but this is one of the closest I have seen – I’m very excited for people to experience what a fantastic job they have done.

08/01/2026

27/12/2025

We’ve had a lot of messages about these particular posters, so we thought we’d explain them a bit more clearly. All of them were made specifically for fly-posting and were never sold at the time. There were (we think) three rounds of fly-posting before the album was released. These posters are from the first round, and went up in New York, LA, Boston, San Francisco and Chicago in February 2013. We deliberately chose not to feature any image of David Bowie. Because they relate to a forthcoming release, they deal instead with ideas of consumer desire and anticipation. The white square interrupts that process, and the words The Next Day suggest that desire is never quite satisfied

All the images in this series are library photographs. Part of the concept was that there should be nothing individual about them at all – they weren’t specially shot, they already existed, ready for use in advertising. Each image symbolises an aspect of aspirational consumerism: the woman spraying perfume suggests increased attractiveness through purchase; the interior represents the promise of a beautiful home or holiday and a happier future; the tablet stands for the consumer device that makes leisure time more absorbing; and the hyper-real, almost Pop image of the drink symbolises the promise of consumer ‘abundance’.

A limited number of these very rare original flyposters available at shop.barnbrook.net

07/12/2025

We’ve are consolidating the studio archive and have just released a small batch of original 2013 flyposters from ‘The Next Day’. There are two series. Series 1 focused on objects of consumer desire. Series 2 is directly connected to Bowie – featuring lyrics and the photography from the album’s package design. These were created as teasers for album launch and appeared on the streets of New York. They’re extremely rare, and we only have a handful left.

Each poster is an original production piece from 2013, not a reprint or later edition. They were never meant for sale, so this is a rare chance to get one.

They’re priced at £250 for the less-rare designs and £400 for the scarce ones – we know that’s not small money, but they’re genuinely hard to find and we’ve kept pricing as modest as possible. You can choose to have it signed by Jonathan Barnbrook or left unsigned.

Available now in the shop at barnbrook.net.