21 Talk

As many people are now aware, the musician and actor David Bowie has a longstanding interest in art -- he has created it, collected it, studied it, and written considerably on it. In 1994, Bowie set about to secure an interview with the legendary and reclusive painter Batthus for Britain's Modern Painters magazine. It was Bowie's first venture into interviewing an artist, and it proved to be a daunting assignment -- Balthus was legendary for refusing interviews. Bowie secured the interview, and the results were better than anyone, including Bowie, could have hoped for. Over the next four years, Bowie did regular interviews with artists such as Damien Hirst, Roy Lichtenstein, Tony Oursler, Jeff Koons and Tracey Emin. This book is the first to collect all these interviews, which read together form a lively, wide-ranging exploration into the contemporary art world. Bowie, it turns out, is a first-rate interviewer -- one with a deep knowledge of his subjects, and with a penchant for establishing both frankness and ease.