David Bowie's Life Through Music, Fashion, Art, And Film

David Bowie (Instagram @davidbowie)

JAKARTA - January 10 is marked as the day of the departure of the legendary musician, David Bowie. As an iconic figure, Bowie's music and life are always interesting to talk about. In the middle of the musical process, he also experimented a lot with cinema, acting, fashion, and others.

His first album, The Man Who Sold The World, was Bowie's big step towards commercial success. At that time she appeared androgynous by wearing a dress in every appearance and interview session - stealing the public's attention.

When talking about David Bowie, then we don't separate his name from the various personas he created, such as Major Tom, Ziggy Stardust, Aladdin Sane, Thin White Duke, Halloween Jack, The Soul Man, Pierrot, and Elephant Man.

Ziggy Stardust became Bowie's most popular persona. His trademark - dressed in quirky costumes with brownish red color. The man who was born January 8, 1947, presented Ziggy Stardust through a stage at the Toby Jug Pub, Kingston in 1972.

The success with Ziggy Stardust, David Bowie seemed to replace the character with the presence of the album and persona Aladdin Sane in 1973. This album contains Bowie's relationship with world tours, sex, violence, drugs, to death. It is known that some of the lyrics from Aladdin Sane's album were written in the middle of a United States tour.

The two personas of Ziggy Stardust and Aladdin Sane cannot be separated from the contributions of Japanese designers, Kansai Yamamoto. Bowie has idolized Kansai ever since the designer's work was shown at London Fashion Week in 1971. The Japanese concept of Basara has an eccentric meaning that fits well with David Bowie's vision of dress.

Bowie is known as a person who has no restrictions in clothing. There are no specific styles for men or women in David Bowie's fashion dictionary.

Love Acting and Drawing Art

As well as a career as a musician, he was also an artist when he moved to Switzerland in 1976. He spent time drawing and his paintings went on sale for auction. Her first art exhibition was New Afro / Pagan And Work in 1995. The Under Pressure singer also has a large collection of works of art from Henry Moore, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Derek Boshier, and others.

His love for the world of acting is no less than the world of art. His debut appearance was in the BBC drama series Theater 625 which was broadcast in May 1968. Later, he was cast as the lead role in the film The Man Who Fell to Earth as Thomas Jerome Newton. Bowie won the best actor award at the Saturn Award for this film.

During his career in the world of roles, David Bowie has starred in 36 films and television series. Some of the films he starred in were Just a Gigolo, The Hunger, and Zoolander. His most recent appearance was in a cameo as himself in the film Bandslam, a 2009 teen comedy film.

Criticism of Racism in the Music Industry

Recently, a video of David Bowie in the past went viral. The video was posted by a person named Morgan Jerkins in which David Bowie questioned the MTV television channel not playing songs by black musicians.

“I was devastated by the fact that few black artists were on (MTV). Why?"

The journalist named Mark Goodman replied because MTV wanted to present artists who were in line with MTV's targets not for public listeners.

“The fact is that there are only a few (black skin) artists who are broadcast from 2.30 am to 6. Very few (musicians) perform at midday. There are lots of black artists who make good music videos and don't appear on MTV. "

Goodman said, "We have to think it's not just New York or Los Angeles that is appreciating but the Plowkeepsie area or the Midwest as well."

"Name one town in the Midwest that would be terrified of black people, or black music," replied David Bowie.

The interview snippet became the talk of the public and Bowie's fans. Rapper Missy Elliot also tweeted the tweet and thanked Bowie for knowing the issue of racism in the music world.

In 1983, when David Bowie got MTV together and asked them why weren't they playing Black artists >>>>> pic.twitter.com/rHavzF6kqA

- Morgan Jerkins (@MorganJerkins) January 4, 2021

Blackstar, David Bowie's Final Work

Five years ago on January 8, 2016, David Bowie released the album Blackstar. Two days later, he died of liver cancer. No one knows the disease apart from the people closest to it.

In the midst of his struggles, Bowie worked on the Blackstar album. Bowie's influence in working on the Blackstar album was rapper Kendrick Lamar's To Pimp a Butterfly. He was inspired because Kendrick Lamar is a rapper but his album is not very hip-hop.

To NME, Donny McCaslin, a Bowie band player, recalled the time when the star asked the band to work on the album without worry. Some of the lyrics in this album also hint that fans are talking about his death. “Something happened on the day he died. Spirit rose a meter and stepped aside. " he said in a Blackstar song.

“Look up here, I'm in heaven. I've got scars that can't be seen. " said Bowie in Lazarus.

The album creation process was completed in May 2015 and health problems never prevented Bowie from completing the album. In the Lazarus music video released on January 7, 2016, Bowie plays a patient who lies in bed. The final scene is Bowie getting into a cupboard and closing the door - what fans mean is closing the casket.

"It's amazing because no one thought what happened to his health condition. And he (Bowie) is very professional, "said Robert Fox, Lazarus song producer.

For David Bowie, Blackstar was never the last album. Bowie always expresses his creativity fully and he is not afraid to see the perspective of music from various genres. The Blackstar album became David Bowie's first album to reach No.1 in the United States and 20 other countries.

Even though five years have passed, his work, achievements, points of view and musical style will not go unnoticed.