david bowie is

first photo by me, other photo's sourced from the v&a website, exact location here. 

hello! i know this post is ridiculously late but i had forgotten all about it! i was recently reminded by the fact that the 'david bowie is' exhibition closed at the v&a (august 11th, i think) so i thought it was probably time to finally get this post up haha!
you are probably all aware that i am a big bowie fan so this exhibition was just a dream come true for me. it told the story from his teenage years all the way up to his current success (i visited at the end of march which was around the time when his first album in a decade, 'the next day', had just been released and gone to number one on the album charts), and was generally just so informative.
i'd say it is around 50% displays - costumes, photographs, drawings, etc. - and 50% video and film. you're given headphones before you enter the exhibition, which play bowie songs, but when you move near a screen the headphones pick up the audio from whatever that screen is playing, which i thought was amazing, haha! some rooms were just wall-to-wall screens (which you can kind of see in the right part of the second picture) and it had this kind of over-whelming, all-encompassing feeling, like you were being sucked back to the 70's or something. that particular room was kind of weird though, as one wall played a live show and another played music videos and the headphones kept switching audio as you walked around the room.
the exhibition was largely based on bowie's music career, displaying stage costumes, records, hand-written lyrics, album covers, etc. i got to see some of my favourite costumes of all time, which was so exciting for me; i saw the 'ashes to ashes' clown costume! i almost exploded!
there was also a section devoted to his film career, with one small cinema section where you could sit and watch clips from various films he's starred in. there were lots of props and movie posters around, including the actual crystal ball from labyrinth, which i was very excited about.
one thing that really blew me away, almost completely unrelated, is that there was an andy warhol 'marilyn' there. it was on loan from the tate and was to display bowie's childhood love of pop art and i was literally speechless when i saw it. having studied warhol for several years in high school, it was very surreal to seeing one of his prints in the flesh and it was a very big deal for me.
'david bowie is' was incredible. it's so much more than your average art exhibition; it's interactive, interesting, unique. i think anyone could enjoy it, even if you're not a fan of david bowie.
so, yes, i think that's it. sorry that this post is so late, but better late than never! xx