David Bowie

Photographs taken for London Features International Press Agency of David Bowie documenting his career over an approximately 30-year span and focusing heavily on the later years of the 1970s.

• Sold as a set of 52.
• Archive of David Bowie (English).
• [London, et al.]: [London Features International Press Agency], [ca. 1963–1991].
• Fifty-two original black and white photographs, two of which are a smaller size.
• Agency stamps on verso; some photos also include dates and/or photographers' names in ink on verso.

The earliest images show Bowie circa 1962-3 with his first band -- in performance, lounging alone with saxophone, or having his hair tousled by a Kon-rads bandmate in a posed group shot. From there, the archive progresses through the end of the 1980s, with the bulk of the collection concentrating on the mid- to late '70s as Bowie entered his Thin White Duke period and, through 1976-79, appeared to grow more glamorous and vampiric by the hour.

Most images show Bowie in rehearsal or performance around the Station to Station / Berlin trilogy era(s) but a substantial minority capture him out and about, including one striking image from a Moscow street. Several pictures show Bowie with other famous (Keith Richards, Tina Turner, John McEnroe) or once-famous figures (the actress Sydne Rome). Many include a notation on the place or context, as well as date -- e.g.: "David Bowie at the play "Hurlyburly" at the Westwood Playhouse / Dec 2, 1988" -- and the vast majority of undated photographs can be easily placed within a year or two by tracking the width and enormity of the trousers.

The latest-dated photograph in the collection was taken at the American Cinematheque's Moving Picture Ball at the Century Plaza Hotel, in 1991.