Inside an immersive new David Bowie exhibition at Lightroom: ‘He stands for something we really need right now’ – UK Times

A new David Bowie exhibition at Lightroom in London offers insight into the late artist’s “true personality”, its creators have promised.

Written and directed by Mark Grimmer, David Bowie: You’re Not Alone opens at the immersive space on 22 April and features “holy grail” footage of Bowie performing his song “Heroes” at Earl’s Court in 1978.

Grimmer’s relationship with Bowie’s work goes back to at least 2013, when he served as lead designer on the V&A Museum’s Bowie Is exhibition. “Since that point, I think I’d always thought there was more work to be done with Bowie as a character, as a performer,” he told The Independent.

Following the opening of Lightroom in 2023 with its groundbreaking David Hockney exhibition Bigger & Closer (not smaller & further away), the venue’s team reached out to Bowie’s estate, who came to see the artist’s exhibit. “It was one of those lovely coming-together moments where we figured out a way to do it, with this direct line of conversation with the estate,” Grimmer said.

He collaborated on the Bowie exhibition with Lightroom’s executive producer David Sabel, along with key figures including the “Rebel Rebel” icon’s longtime publicist Alan Edwards, and Jonathan Barnbrook, who designed the album artwork for Bowie albums including Reality and The Next Day, as well as his final album, 2016’s Blackstar.

“We felt a great privilege to be working on this, and indeed, a great responsibility,” Sabel said. “That’s why we didn’t want to bring other voices into it – we wanted to be led by David’s own voice throughout, and the estate was very clear on that. ‘Let’s let David speak for himself.’”

Bowie, who died in 2016, was often described as an “enigmatic” figure to the public, and his shape-shifting artistic identity was reflected in a number of eccentric, colourful characters, from Ziggy Stardust to the Thin White Duke.

Sabel pointed to the “intimacy” Lightroom offers in its ability to tell stories through mixed media, from archive footage of Bowie’s interviews and performances to handwritten lyrics and his iconic fashion through the years, something he pointed out was reflected in Bowie’s own “hunger for connection with the audience”.

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“I never got to see him live, and through this show I have a sense of it,” he said. “Of course it’s never the same, but I do feel like I’ve got to see this incredible range of performances and time-travel a little bit.”

Grimmer said working on the exhibition had reminded him how Bowie “continually surprises”, and of the late artist’s “self-deprecating” side. “One of the things that’s been fun about the research for this project is [having] access to a lot of material involving more offhand chats between interviewers and Bowie, and that’s really given us a bit of a kind of insight into his true personality,” he said.

“I think the show does possibly take the enigma out of it, because he makes you laugh,” Sabel agreed. “He sounds like us in that he’s someone who’s grappling with the hard questions of life: what it means about how to connect to other people and how to make an impact with the thing that you love doing. So in that sense, he becomes very, very human.”

Asked whether – given the number of exhibitions, documentaries and tribute concerts that have taken place since Bowie’s death – we might be reaching “Bowie saturation point”, Grimmer argued that what the singer represented was more important than ever.

“He represents something we can take a great deal of inspiration from, which is a creative curiosity,” he said. “He went out and read everything, he took himself to the theater, he went to see films, he was into the Beat poets… if the show does anything, [I hope] it encourages young people to pick up a book, or go to a gallery, to connect with something. That’s the best we can hope for, in some ways.”

He continued: “I think Bowie stands for something we really need right now, which is curiosity, openness, a passion for creativity… I think there’s something in that enthusiasm and hunger [he had] for life and for the power that art has to connect people. So I think we’ll keep reaching for Bowie for as long as we need him.”

‘David Bowie: You’re Not Alone’ opens at Lightroom on 22 April 2026; tickets from £27.