In 1997, it was thirty years since The Beatles recorded their influential LP, Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Bluecoat gallery staff worked with a group of artists and designers to recreate the record's iconic sleeve as a gallery installation based on the original design by Peter Blake and Jann Haworth.

Over 80 artists, poets and musicians associated with Bluecoat were invited to nominate their cultural heroes, and images of these formed a large tableau of life-sized cut-out figures. The assemblage was an eclectic mix that included Frida Kahlo, Karl Marx, Malcolm X, Billie Holiday, Lee Perry, Yoko Ono, Germaine Greer, Captain Beefheart, Posh Spice, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Duke Ellington, Minnie the Minx, Bo Diddley, Gandhi, Tommy Cooper and eco-activist 'Swampy'.

The tableau, which is shown elsewhere on this site, was accompanied by an exhibition of Pepper pastiches from record and CD covers, greetings cards, posters and adverts. This display included an assemblage, shown here, from Jim Phelan of Exotica Records, a recreation of one of his own 'Exotic Beatles' compilation CDs.