GDS ARCHIVES

    All of our past editions in one place and freely accessible to readers.

    POSTERS

    Celebrating the archives

    To coincide with the release of our archives, we invited four artists to celebrate each decade since our inception.

      Melody Woodnutt‘s short black and white film celebrates the grungy, punky, photocopied vibes of 1980s GDS, with the somewhat eery black & white photography which graced its covers during this decade.

    ↬  Jason Cavanagh‘s vivid and surreal oil painting shows the fabulist, often dark, gritty energy of 1990s GDS, whose pages and covers were filled with traditional fine arts like painting and etching. 

    ⇻  Kate Geck‘s popping gif encapsulates the naughties perfectly – with its Windows sky blue screensaver, brick phones and CDs – and shows 2000s GDS‘ playful move into the millennium. 

    ⇴  Maeve Baker‘s digital illustration celebrates 2010s GDS, which headed towards bold colours and lines and made bold tracks in exploring book design-as-art. 

    The graphic design for the posters was done by the multi-talented Michael Sun. You can read more about the artworks, artists and posters here.

    From October 25 to 19 November 2021, each poster will be displayed around the City of Melbourne, to bring GDS’ rich history to its city’s streets.

    Street poster celebrating the 1980s. Going Down Swinging written in large, black, all-caps text. Featured is a black and white image of a building, with transparent images of an angel reaching out its arm repeating down the left side and a person with long hair in the ocean on the left side.
    Bright, burnt orange poster celebrating the 1990s. Going Down Swinging written in large, black, all-caps text. Featured is a colourful oil painting: a thick green beanstalk branches up from top to bottom, with red grass and a cityscape behind it on the bottom left and a stick figure reclining sadly on a white, painted out section which says 'THIS IS COOL' on the bottom right. Hanging on the beanstalk is a flying blue figure, a yellow and orange daisy with a surprised expression and two little yellow gnomes in stripey red and white hats, and a melting white candle. The background is mostly blue skies, but the top right opens a portal onto a moody blue and pink sunset and black silhouetted mountain.
    Bright, sky blue poster celebrating the 1990s. Going Down Swinging written in large, black, all-caps text. Centred is a digital artwork fading from white (bottom) to the same blue (top) as the old Windows screensaver. The bottom of the artwork has the old grey Windows Start bar. In the centre of the artwork is a circle, ringed by an illustrated grey chain. In the background of the circle are glitched images of the Windows green field and blue cloudy sky screensaver/desktop background. On top of it are images of silver CDs, stacked tabs of Myspace profiles, some grey bubbles, and, visually dominating, two illustrated hands with checkered grey and white skin holding an old Nokia mobile phone and playing Snake.
    Light, grassy green poster celebrating the 1990s. Going Down Swinging written in large, black, all-caps text. A huge artwork is featured depicting three long-haired people in blue dresses sleeping on chairs. Their chairs sit on a red and white checkered floor which curves Escher-like into the distance. Framing the scene are huge red/pink archways which open up fully onto a purpley-blue dusky sky with huge, naif white and yellow stars. Centred is a bright yellow sun partially obscured by the meeting of the two archways.

    80s GDS

    90s GDS

    2000s GDS

    2010s GDS

    BUY YOUR FAVOURITE BACK ISSUES

    Love the archives? You can grab a physical copy of your favourite editions from the GDS online shop.

    Every edition you buy helps support Going Down Swinging and our future ventures into the wild world of anthology publishing!

    This project was made possible by