BOWIE: From Major Tom to Major Arcana: Original rarely seen artwork by David Bowie, with iconic photographic collaborations
Masterpiece Art Ltd are delighted to welcome you to BOWIE: From Major Tom to Major Arcana.
Inspiration for the exhibition began with the discovery of an original full set of the Arcane Series – Lovers, Death, Star, Moon, Earth, five silkscreens after the tarot made by David Bowie in Los Angeles, November 1975.
First executed in an edition of 50, they were gifted by Bowie to family and friends and only made available to the public in the mid-to-late 1990s in a re-release of smaller dimensions as a far larger edition. As such, the large scale originals seen here today have not been exhibited publicly since David Bowie: New Afro/Pagan and Work 1975-1995 (London 1995), nor have they appeared often on the open market.
Edition 25/50 seen here today was gifted to a RCA Records executive by Bowie in the late 1970s.
Most interestingly it seems that their true meaning was indeed secretive and arcane to its core. As such, Bowie offered little explanation to the series during his lifetime and their scarcity has meant little research has ever been undertaken.
Fascination and excitement grew as we realised the deep iconography behind the series, and their very personal connection to Bowie. This led us to collaborate with flagship “Bowie artists” such as those seen adorning the gallery walls currently – Brian Duffy, Tony McGee, Geoff MacCormack, Masayoshi Sukita, among others – themselves offering unique, intimate insight into the enigmatic life of David Bowie.
The imagery within the Arcane Series is powerful in its own right, full of colour with strong line and resonation. The hidden secret is in viewing them as a set as they tell an engrossing story which combines Bowie’s song writing, esoteric exploration, private beliefs, paranoid-lows and unparalleled highs. Ultimately they suggest a chosen route along the Kabbalistic Tree of Life, a possible divination and mapped transcendence from Kether to Malkuth, and back to Kether – a complete journey of the soul to enlightenment.
As representations of the Major Arcana, the 22 trump cards of the tarot, we have Lovers, the 6th trump card; Death, the 13th trump card; Star, the 17th; Moon the 18th; Earth, the 21st. Combined they total seventy-five, 1975 being the year Bowie created the artworks and part of the broader spell that unravels in analysing the Arcane Series.
In various literature Bowie is repeatedly reported to have been deeply interested in “magick”, and around 1975 actively practicing even. He had developed a firmly established interest in the occult and importantly for us here, Aleister Crowley
(1875-1947), the famed and derided British occultist celebrated by many rock stars of the late-1960s and 1970s.
Irrespective of Crowley’s reputation, he created an extremely popular tarot set, the Thoth Tarot, accompanied with an indepth Book of Thoth that explained the mass of varied iconography behind the cards. Bowie is reported to have owned and been using these in 1975 and probably earlier, which explains the specifically Thoth Tarot imagery within the Arcane Series.
The same interests that created these artworks also inspired ‘Station to Station’ and The Thin White Duke. An interest in Crowley and Kabbalah is alluded to in songs from Hunky Dory LP. (1971) through to Station to Station LP. (1976), with Bowie’s interest in Kabbalah arguably reaffirmed by his outfit worn in the video of ‘Lazarus’ (2016).
Many of the accompanying artworks have been carefully selected to show the David Bowie of Los Angeles and 1975, likewise his chameleonic aura from famed photoshoots. A wider selection of artworks from the exhibiting artists is available upon enquiry.
We invite you to discover more about the exhibition by reading the accompanying catalogue and speaking with the Masterpiece Art staff.
Finally we wish to thank our partners and sponsors, all the artists and their dedicated teams who have helped to create this exhibition.
EXHIBITION | BOWIE: From Major Tom to Major Arcana
6 January - 21 February 2020
OCCULTISM IN THE ARCANE SERIES
By Alex Cousens
In place of Buddhist meditation, he became obsessed in the seventies with the exploration of the occult: the search for hidden powers and meanings, the attempt to reach beyond the conscious into a realm of unimaginable riches and danger. And it was that quest for something beyond that also inspired his artistic experiments, encouraging him to reach through or around familiar techniques to access material and methods that would help him to overcome the limitations and repressions of the everyday world around him.
Peter Doggett, The Man Who Sold the World: David Bowie and the 1970s (2011)
As David Bowie had proven with ‘Space Oddity’ (1969), he was an aficionado of current societal developments, yearnings and cultural issues – connecting with the disillusioned British youth who were rapidly converting to his loyal fanbase.
While the Apollo 11 moon landing captured the imagination of the world, so too did its “unofficial soundtrack” released the same month of July. ‘Space Oddity’ (1969) spurred young minds further, to look beyond conventional limitations for long-sought answers that science could not explain, towards sentiment that had been brewing for some years.
Bowie would continue to champion this cutting-edge understanding of his audience through an unforeseen liberalism manifested in his many varied personas, underlined by an androgynous sexual ambiguity and endless reel of suggestive lyrics throughout the seventies.
His imagery, literal and lyrical, had begun to address prevalent notions of fear, acceptance and understanding – fearlessly immersing himself in subjects thought to be taboo. Thus helping give voice to a youth struggling for identity and meaning in a “new age”.
Running through it all was the conviction – already a manifesto amongst the youthful counter-culture – that conventional explanations of the world, and mankind’s place within it, were ineffective and partial.
Catalogue continues | Please DOWNLOAD the catalogue
