Didn’t make it to the globe-spanning David Bowie Is… exhibition last year? Didn’t get a chance to explore the life and work of the genius musician who had, at the time, made a glorious comeback with his stellar, self-referential album ‘The Next Day’? Devastated because you had no idea he’d only release one more album, the ultra-dark ‘Blackstar’, eerily released just two days before his death in 2016? Well, here’s a second chance to experience the exhibition – this time in app form.
David Bowie Is…, a collection of costumes, original artworks, handwritten lyrics and more, closed for the last time in Brooklyn last summer, having worked its way around galleries all over the world. There was pandemonium when the visual feast made its way to the UK in 2013, and it became the most popular exhibition ever created for London’s Victoria & Albert Museum, where it debuted, attracting 1.5 million visitors across its eight-date stint.
And now you can explore the exhibition from the comfort of your mobile phone for the low, low price of £7.99. It’s like actually attending it, but there’s no-one else around and and you can spend as a long as you want admiring the exhibits. You move your camera as though you’re moving through the room, the screen filling with the costumes, lyrics sheets and more that are on offer. Even better – narration comes from none other than Bowie’s old mucker Gary Oldman.
It’s been put together by Bowie’s estate and Sony Music Entertainment (Japan) Inc., who hosted the exhibition in Tokyo in 2017. It’s the first time an exhibition has been transformed into this kind of immersive AR experience, and a fitting tribute to a musician who tirelessly pushed forward throughout his unparalleled five-decade career. Ultimately, exhibition might make you miss him even more – not least when, at one point, we hear him say, ““I love life very much indeed”.
Still undecided if it’s worth £7.99 on the App Store? Check out the exclusive David Bowie Is… app photos below, as they’re bound to change you mind.
