New book reveals unseen early Pink Floyd photographs
Written by Matt   
Wednesday, 17 November 2021

PINK FLOYD - THE NICO VAN DER STAM ARCHIVESOrders are now being taken for a book stuffed with incredible Pink Floyd pictures from 1967 onwards. Limited to just 1000 numbered copies (which are expected to sell quickly), Pink Floyd - The Nico van der Stam Archives, published on December 1st, 2021, is presented as a deluxe clothbound and hardback edition, with 112 heavyweight pages, and signed by the author.

His images of Syd Barrett’s The Pink Floyd from 1967 are of an iconic beauty. However, few people in the Netherlands – and even less abroad – associate these photos with photographer Nico van der Stam (Rotterdam 1925 – Amsterdam 2000), who captured the band in Amsterdam in April 1967, and again two months later in London. Initially focused on documenting everyday city life and the flourishing local jazz scene, Van der Stam soon turned his lens on the emerging pop music, photographing such luminaries as Jimi Hendrix, David Bowie, The Mothers Of Invention, The Doors, Cream, Janis Joplin, The Kinks, The Supremes and The Pink Floyd. He was regularly found in studios where artists were recording for radio and television. "I went to the studios, took pictures of rehearsals and recordings and then sold them to the broadcasting companies."

The few pictures of Pink Floyd that are previously published – without exception in a characteristic square format and not normally seen in colour – are just an excerpt from Van der Stam's immense catalogue which holds over a million negatives.

For this new book, Floydstuff's Charles Beterams has taken a deep dive into Van der Stam's archive, exploring and unearthing the photographer's breathtaking oeuvre. An unprecedented amount of newly discovered Pink Floyd transparencies and negatives – starting with those from the aforementioned 1967 sessions of the band in all its psychedelic glory – have been catalogued, scanned and retouched for the very first time.

Nico van der Stam also took pictures of Pink Floyd during their 1969 and 1970 concerts at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw. By the time the band played the Rotterdam Ahoy’ in 1971, he was no longer doing concert photography himself, assigning requisite duties to his then assistant Govert de Roos, who went on to become a renowned photographer in his own right and kindly provides the foreword to this book. Most of the pictures from these three gigs are available to the public eye for the very first time.

Pink Floyd – The Nico van der Stam Archives is not only a well-deserved tribute to a unique photo press agency but also an impressive and hitherto unseen insight into the legendary British band’s defining years.

Sounds like another essential purchase to us! The text in the book is in English, and you can secure your copy now through Floydstuff.com, who will ship the book worldwide.

To coincide with the publishing of the book, Maria Austria Instituut - which preserves Nico's archives - has made three of his most iconic images available as limited art prints - one of them by Pink Floyd. They can be ordered directly from the Maria Austria Instituut.