19 September 2026
Booking is now open for a conference Dr Matt Melia and I have been putting together for many months. Late Bowie takes place at the Visconti Studio, Kingston University, on Thursday 5 and Friday 6 November 2026, and it's the studio's tenth anniversary year, which feels like the right moment to do it.
The subject is Bowie's final period: The Next Day, Lazarus, and ★, the work he made while thinking hard about legacy and transience, and what has happened to that work in the ten years since. It's also about the archive, and the archival impulse in Bowie's artistic expression. The David Bowie Centre at V&A East Storehouse opened last year, and the conference also looks at what it holds and what it makes possible.
Over two days we have around twenty papers from scholars in the UK, Europe, the US, and Japan, alongside a set of guests who've had a direct hand in Bowie's work and legacy:
- Harriet Reed, project lead for the David Bowie Archive at V&A East Storehouse, giving the opening keynote, with an archive workshop later in the day led by Claire Watt, Bowie Fellow at the V&A
- Jonathan Barnbrook, the designer behind the artwork for Heathen, Reality, The Next Day, and Blackstar, giving the closing keynote
- Peter Carpenter, author of Bowieland, in conversation with film and television producer Kevin Loader
- a screening of Mark Jenkin's short film David Bowie Is Dead (2018)
Panels cover the archive, memorial culture and fandom, Bowie on film, lateness and celebrity, absence, and mortality. I'll be giving a paper on The Next Day and the sounding archive.
The conference is in person only. Tickets are £25 per day or £40 for both, and booking closes on 3 November.
Full details and programme on the Kingston University events page
On the Saturday after the conference, 7 November, we're leading a free walking tour of Bowie's London, meeting at Leicester Square tube at 11am and heading through Soho to Heddon Street, with an optional trip south to the Brixton mural afterwards. It's open to conference attendees and a guest each. Places are limited.
There will also be a curated programme of video essays and creative work on the Visconti Studio YouTube channel, for people who can't get to Kingston. I'll post the call for contributions here shortly.