David Bowie

David Bowie was born David Robert Jones in Brixton, London, in 1947. After years on the fringes of the British music scene, he broke through in 1969 with 'Space Oddity,' released days before the Apollo 11 moon landing. His fascination with theatre, mime, and the avant-garde set him apart from his peers and shaped an approach in which image and music were inseparable.

In 1972 he introduced Ziggy Stardust, the alien rock star persona that made him a superstar and changed ideas of identity and performance in pop. He then shed that skin repeatedly: the soul-inflected Young Americans, the experimental Berlin albums made with Brian Eno, and the global pop success of Let's Dance in 1983. He also acted on stage and screen, earning praise for roles in film and theatre.

Bowie continued to make adventurous music into his final days, releasing the acclaimed album Blackstar on his sixty-ninth birthday, two days before his death from cancer in January 2016. The world learned only then how deliberately he had shaped his farewell. His career remains the great example of artistic reinvention, and his influence runs through rock, pop, fashion, and art.