Leigh bowery costumes

The family were congregants of the Salvation Army, but Leigh stopped attending services at around the age of fifteen. From his mother and female relatives, whose company he favoured, he learned to knit, crochet, and sew. Educated at Sunshine Primary and Sunshine West High schools, he gained entry —78 to the selective Melbourne High School, where he learned the piano and took part in school opera productions.

Several friends recalled his claim that the school uniform was a passport to casual sexual encounters with older men at Flinders Street Station. He briefly studied fashion design at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, but chafed at the requirements of the course and did not graduate.

Leigh bowery height

Having saved some money working at Waltons department store, in October Bowery moved to London, where he found work at a Burger King restaurant. He assumed a cockney accent soon after arriving and tended to conceal his Australian origins. By mid he was on the dole, sporadically earning small sums by making clothes for acquaintances. He lived in bedsits and squats until January , when he moved to a council flat at Stepney with his friend Gary Barnes, a visual artist known as Trojan.

Bowery was inspired by the colourful wares and clothing of the many Indian and Pakistani people who lived in the area. At cm tall and notably weighty, Bowery commanded the runway in a floppy hat, long black wig, satin pantaloons, and nylon-frilled scuffs.

Leigh bowery last photo

With his friend Rachel Auburn, Bowery sold clothes at Kensington Market, but by he had essentially abandoned the idea of producing garments for commercial sale. In January he began hosting a fortnightly club night called Taboo, at a small club in Leicester Square. It soon became a weekly event, with Bowery its outstanding attraction as host, entertainer, and provocateur.

Bowery created costumes for several productions by the Scottish dancer and choreographer Michael Clark, including No Fire Escape in Hell , for which he shared a New York Dance and Performance Bessie award for visual design. They were a source of income for Bowery and several friends and collaborators, notably Nicola Joy Ann Bateman, a printed-textiles graduate with whom he became tenderly and protectively close.