Words Dolores O’Donoghue
The V&A East Storehouse in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford, East London now provides the first permanent public access to the complete David Bowie archive. Moving away from the conventions of a retrospective, it presents Bowie’s working material as an active archive. Drafts, sketches and preparatory documents sit alongside completed works, offering a rare insight into how ideas were developed, tested and, in many cases, left unresolved.
The displays draw from an archive of more than 90,000 items, with around 200 objects on view across nine rotating presentations. Together, they span Bowie’s career from early experimentation through to his final projects, placing finished works alongside sketches, drafts and preparatory material. The emphasis is not on chronology, but on themes such as creative process, collaboration, performance and influence.
Among the most compelling exhibits are materials related to The Spectator, a musical Bowie was developing until his death in 2016. Set in 18th-century London, the project never progressed beyond the planning stage, but the archive preserves its evolution in detail. Displayed notebooks, index cards and handwritten notes outline characters, scenes and historical events, including public executions and London’s criminal underworld. The material shows Bowie researching social change, performance and spectacle, and offers a clear example of how his late work remained conceptually ambitious and historically informed.
Costume is another central element of the centre. Overhead, a selection of Bowie’s outfits is displayed in their special storage bags. These include Ziggy Stardust designs by Freddie Burretti, Agnès b’s Heathen ensembles, Bowie’s 1992 Thierry Mugler wedding suit and a frock coat co-designed with Alexander McQueen for the artist’s 50th birthday concert. Seen together, the costumes chart the development of Bowie’s stage personas and his long-standing engagement with fashion as a vital artistic medium.
Musical instruments and equipment are shown alongside the visual material. Highlights include Bowie’s first saxophone, bought for him by his father when he was a teenager, and instruments associated with key moments in his recording career. These objects sit alongside handwritten lyrics, annotated set lists and studio photographs, many of which capture Bowie working with collaborators such as Tony Visconti, Luther Vandross and Gail Ann Dorsey. The displays underline the extent to which his work was shaped by collaboration, experimentation and revision.
The centre also includes material from the artist’s final albums, The Next Day and Blackstar. Sketches, props, costumes and handwritten notes from this period show how closely Bowie remained involved in the visual and conceptual aspects of his work. Items such as origami birds made for a magazine shoot, costume elements from the ‘Lazarus’ video and drawings created by Bowie himself demonstrate a sustained interest in symbolism and narrative, even in his final years.
In addition to the displays, the David Bowie Centre allows visitors to book one-to-one appointments to view items from the archive through the V&A’s Order an Object service. This approach reinforces the centre’s purpose as an archive rather than a static exhibition, encouraging close study of original material. For visitors without appointments, topic boxes containing reproductions provide further context and allow deeper engagement with specific themes.
The David Bowie Centre presents Bowie not simply as a performer or icon, but as a working artist whose practice crossed music, design, writing and performance. By focusing on drafts, processes and unfinished ideas as much as completed works, it offers a clear and detailed picture of how Bowie developed his ideas and his continual drive to experiment with boundary-pushing innovations and creative forms throughout his life and career.
- ‘The David Bowie Centre: A new home for the artist’s archive’ is published in Anthology Volume 25. Read more features from this volume or buy it now.
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