New David Bowie museum in London unmasks the man behind the make-up
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An outfit worn by late British musician David Bowie is displayed at the David Bowie Centre in the V&A East Storehouse in London, Britain.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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LONDON – A moving letter written by David Bowie’s father and fan mail from Lady Gaga are among 90,000 items at a new London museum offering intimate insights into the man behind the Ziggy Stardust make-up.
The David Bowie Centre, which opened on Sept 13, features iconic costumes, instruments and stage props used by the Space Oddity (1969) singer, who died in 2016 aged 69, as well as elaborate drawings and scribbled notes.
One of the most revealing items is a letter written by the English pop star’s father, Haywood Jones, to a company where his son was hoping to work as he made his way as a young musician.
“I don’t think I could have taken all the setbacks he has taken and come up smiling and still be full of confidence and fight,” the letter stated.
“Whenever he takes on an idea of any kind, he never lets up and puts everything he has got into it. In fact, I have often suggested he works too hard at times, it is impossible to get him to relax.”
The letter is appropriately displayed next to another, dated July 1968, from Apple Records to Bowie’s management team.
“As we told you on the phone, Apple Records is not interested in signing David Bowie. We don’t feel he is what we are looking for at the moment,” it read.
The display also looks at creative tools Bowie used for inspiration, such as cut-up lyrics and strategy cards.
“It’s an extremely powerful reminder that no idea is too small,” said Ms Madeleine Haddon, lead curator for the centre.
“Bowie treated the creative process as something worth documenting at every stage, and you get to see behind the scenes into that process.”
Lyrics and an outfit worn by late British musician David Bowie displayed at the David Bowie Centre in the V&A East Storehouse in London, Britain.
PHOTO: REUTERS
The centre is located inside the V&A museum’s vast new building in east London, a fitting setting for an artiste who still looms large over the musical landscape.
Reflecting his contemporary influence, part of the show is curated by English indie rock band The Last Dinner Party, while a handwritten letter from American pop star Lady Gaga reads: “I feel my entire career has been an artistic plea for you to notice me”.
Another area displays meticulous notes detailing Bowie’s unrealised projects, including a stage adaptation of George Orwell’s 1949 novel 1984, which was torpedoed by the English author’s widow.
Other notes reveal that Bowie was working on The Spectator, a musical inspired by 18th-century London. One post-it note suggests “many sex scenes”.
Notes on The Spectator musical by late British musician David Bowie displayed at the David Bowie Centre in the V&A East Storehouse in London, Britain.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Around 200 of the items are on display, but visitors can book one-on-one time with any of the archived items, which include the metal key to Bowie and American singer Iggy Pop’s notoriously hedonistic Berlin apartment they shared in the late 1970s.
Other entries include elaborate stage costumes when Bowie toured as his alter-egos The Thin White Duke and Ziggy Stardust, along with battered guitars and fan art.
The centre lays bare Bowie’s obsessive collecting and detailing of items, however mundane, highlighting his acute sense of legacy building, even in death.
A guitar owned by late British musician David Bowie is displayed at the David Bowie Centre in the V&A East Storehouse in London, Britain.
PHOTO: REUTERS
“We were very fortunate that it (the archive) came to us in a really well-organised state,” said the V&A’s archivist Sabrina Offord.
From the 1990s, Bowie “was sending material to his team for inclusion in the archive with notes explaining the context of where that material came from and where he thought it would fit”, she added. AFP
