On Thursday, an eagerly-anticipated retrospective focused on the late Leigh Bowery opens at Tate Modern. This comes hot on the heels of Outlaws: Renegades of ’80s London, at the Fashion & Textiles Museum, an exhibition which also places Bowery centre stage and has been packing-in crowds since it opened last October.
Leigh Bowery! at Tate Modern unleashes a thrill-laden curation of costumes, photographs, paintings and films. These collectively celebrate and explore the multihyphenate’s multi-layered life and legacy, acknowledging the collaborative spirit which underpinned Bowery’s remarkable output, and confirming why his personality and physical presence made him such an appealing model for the artist, Lucian Freud, whose incredible nudes of Bowery are included in the exhibition.
After leaving his suburban upbringing in Australia to move to London in 1980, Bowery became a trailblazing figure whose creative adventures across fashion and costume design, nightlife, art, TV, contemporary dance and music created shock and awe in equal measure. He died at the age of 33, in 1994, from complications arising from AIDS, but the wit and cleverness of his ideas and designs have continued to influence fashion designers including Rick Owens, John Galliano, Alexander McQueen and Charles Jeffrey ever since, along the way spawning Bowery-probing books, documentaries and even a West End musical.
Here, we unearth some memorable archive footage from the ’80s and ’90s, capturing Bowery’s inimitable appearances on various TV shows, in music videos, an art gallery performance, an advert for a Jeans brand, and as the star of several documentaries about him made both during his life and after his death.
Starring in his own documentary
The London-centric TV culture show, South of Watford, dedicated a whole 30-minute episode to Bowery, broadcast in 1986. This was a really big deal back in the pre-digital days of no internet or social media, and with only four UK TV channels to choose from. A very young Hugh Laurie was the presenter, interviewing Bowery at home in his riotously-gaudy East London council flat, hanging out with him at a giddy BodyMap fashion show, and braving a night out at Bowery’s notorious club, Taboo, which had become the after-hours hangout of mid-’80s London. The day-time glimpses of Bowery in full regalia and ambling through a rough and ready Brick Lane, years before the area was gentrified, offer yet another reminder of his fearlessness.
Starring in various music videos
The video for Lana Pellay (aka Lana P)’s 1986 single, Pistol in my Pocket, was filmed at Taboo. In addition to starring Lana – resplendent in various frocks fashioned by Bowery – it also featured cameo appearances from Mr Bowery himself and some of his talented chums including Mark Lawrence the designer, DJ and style icon Princess Julia and Sue Tilley, who some years later authored Bowery’s biography, The Life and Times of an Icon. The classic Hi-NRG track became a major club fave in the UK, and a top twenty hit in Australia. BTW: Bowery and Pellay also previously both appeared together in the madcap office party-themed and ultra-low budget video for The Fall’s 1985 single, Cruiser’s Creek, directed by Bowery’s artist pal Cerith Wyn Evans.
Appearing On a primetime fashion programme
BBC 1’s weekly fashion-focused The Clothes Show was massively popular in the ’80s, regularly attracting up to nine million viewers when it was beamed into the UK’s homes on Sunday evenings. No doubt, many of them had never encountered anyone quite like Bowery, though, prior to tuning-in to this 1988 episode. Needless to say, he didn’t disappoint eagerly discussing his latest designs and modelling them in high-camp mode within Harrods’ department store, as shoppers look on somewhat bewilderedly in the background. Note the children clapping delightedly when Bowery parades past them in Harrods’ tea room – they totally got it.
Being a living work of art
In 1988, Bowery was invited to stage his own art show at the Anthony d’Offay Gallery in central London. Notably, he was the art. From behind a two-way mirror – he could see himself, but not anyone looking at him from the other side – Bowery spent five consecutive days posing for hours on end in a dazzling selection of looks. All his clubbing friends came to gawp, of course, but so too did loads of newer converts. The installation marked a turning point for Bowery, boosting his credentials within the art world and further broadening his profile. In this atmospheric footage shot at the gallery you can see him making good use of a chaise longue and revelling in his own glorious reflection! Watch here.
being in a jeans advert
This slick promotional campaign for the popular jeans brand, Pepe Jeans, was made by the award-winning advertising guru and film-maker Tony Kaye. Various versions were screened in cinemas across the UK, in 1989: Bowery’s very distinctive presence among the eclectic cast – as well as the catchy ‘Wears Pepe’ slogan – turned it into one of the most intriguing and memorable ads of the decade. There have never been any confirmed sightings of Bowery actually wearing jeans, though…
Offending the audience on a UK talk show
On this brief extract from Late and Live, a short-lived evening culture show from the early ’90s, a studio audience offered wildly contrasting opinions – one of them branding Bowery a “sick pervert”, for example – after viewing one of his inimitable birthing performances. Cue collective hollers of indignation when Bowery – “casually” clad in his own-designed full-length floral frock and matching mask, topped off with a military helmet – calmly responds by calling them “a dreary unimaginative crowd”. Ouch!
Chatting to Joan Rivers on US telly
Bowery’s reputation as London nightlife’s queen of freaky resonated with fellow daring dressers in the US, during the late-’80s and early-’90s. Hence, on his occasional overseas jaunts, Bowery would regularly hang out and hit the disco with key New York club kids including Michael Alig, James St James, Ernie Glam and Amanda Lepore. On this fuzzy footage from 30-plus years ago, the aforementioned gaggle transpose their nocturnal looks to the bright studio lights of Joan Rivers’ camp chat show. Bowery’s impressive cleavage, in particular, aroused much curiosity and envy from the bemused host.
Giving birth on stage
Bowery’s mind-warping ‘Birthing’ performance was variously staged during the early-’90s in London at one of Michael and Gerlinde Costiff’s legendary Kinky Gerlinky parties, on TV shows, as well as at New York’s 1993 Wigstock festival – as captured in this footage. Bowery would take to the stage in a particularly roomy-looking ensemble and perform a song – in this instance, The Beatles’ All You Need is Love. Then, out of the blue, he would moan and groan, lay flat on his back, and dramatically ‘give birth’ to his seemingly blood-splattered wife Nicola, who emerged from a concealed harness betwixt his legs, along with a fake umbilical cord created with a string of sausages.
More Birthing
In 1993, Bowery appeared on Channel 4’s Naked City show with his band Minty, performing a rousing version of their anthemic and deliciously debauched track Useless Man, culminating with another Birthing performance. This was intercut with an interview in which the presenter, Caitlin Moran, suggested one of Bowery’s looks was “anti-women”, and incongruously asked him about being a “pop star”, all of which he politely batted-off.
The posthumous documentary
Eight years after Bowery’s death, the film maker Charles Atlas – who had two decades previously collaborated with Bowery and his friend, the ballet dancer Michael Clark, on films such as Hail the New Puritan and Because We Must – released The Legend of Leigh Bowery. An 80-minute documentary, brimming with archive footage, plus recollections and observations from many of his friends, along with his sister Bronwyn and dad, Tom, this presents a celebratory unpacking of Bowery’s remarkable life and unforgettable creativity.
