What’s In My Auction: Bella Savignano on the Spring 2025 Subculture Sale

The upcoming Autographs & Subculture sale on Thursday, April 10, will feature an array of pop-culture icons. While prepping for the auction, Bella Savignano, whose background specializes in subculture material, shared a few highlights with us.

At the top of the tour, Savignano takes us through a “psychedelic construction kit” published by the American Publishing Company in 1966, which cheekily calls itself Ludacris Systems Development, a wink to LSD, “I imagine for some publishing need to sensor themselves,” she notes. “It’s a really interesting piece that’s evocative of its time in the ’60s, and not really something you would see commercially produced today,” she continues, commenting on the puzzle’s ties with the rising recreational use of the popular psychedelic drug of the time and the tendency to create art while taking a trip.

Savignano continues on to share work by Jane Bowman, who emerged in the 1970s and 1980s as a prominent figure in the graffiti art and stenciling scenes of the Bay Area and New York City, and a scarce example of original work by Jamie Reid, of Sex Pistols fame.