Photographer Denis O'Regan has opened his complete archive for the first time, revealing an unprecedented visual chronicle of David Bowie that spans decades, continents, and over 200 performances. The new book "David Bowie by Denis O'Regan," published by ACC Art Books, presents never-before-seen images and candid recollections from a photographer who knew the chameleonic rock star as both an icon and a friend. Their creative partnership began with a chance encounter outside Olympic Studios in 1974 and evolved into what O'Regan describes as "a record of proximity" - documenting what it means to move through life alongside an artist who refused to repeat himself.
The fateful collaboration began on a Saturday in 1974 when O'Regan was working at a newspaper shop. Two girls came in giggling, searching for pens and paper, revealing that David Bowie was recording across the road at Olympic Studios. O'Regan had discovered Bowie just a year earlier at the Hammersmith Odeon, a mile away from where he now found himself. He hurried home to fetch his first camera - a second-hand Zenit he had bought from a friend for £5 - and raced back to position himself near the studio steps.
When David's Lincoln Town Car silently glided to the curb, the moment came so swiftly and quietly that O'Regan almost missed it. Determined not to let the opportunity slip away, he returned the following day, better prepared. David remembered him and shared what would prove to be prophetic words: "You should work for NME!" O'Regan could not have foreseen that a decade later, the phrase "Where's Denis?" would be uttered by David Bowie so often that it became a running joke and was voted catchphrase of the year in Sydney during the closing party of the Glass Spider Tour.
O'Regan's journey into music photography had been sparked by Jimmy Page in 1972, but the Ziggy Stardust show at the Hammersmith Odeon in London in 1973 proved transformative, expanding his horizons beyond anything he had previously experienced. As he recalls, "The scales fell from my teenage eyes as red velvet curtains opened on the theatre of my imagination." Bowie's cosmic ballet - a fusion of music and mime with elements of Japanese kabuki - left an indelible mark. A switch flipped within him: "This is the future. This is your future."
The performance featured Mick Ronson in glittering breeches, cutting a dashing rock and roll figure in the Spiders from Mars, his golden Les Paul glinting in the spotlight as it screamed through "Moonage Daydream." The hikinuki technique, which translates as "quick change," was executed at the song's opening as unseen hands tore away David's costume, revealing a mini silk kimono styled by Kansai Yamamoto. The Japanese designer crafted several costumes for David during his Aladdin Sane period, thrusting Bowie's ambisexual androgynous alien persona into the mainstream.
"Aladdin Sane" became the first Seventies album to take its place in O'Regan's vinyl collection, won in a dance competition at a basement club opposite Richmond station, where he strolled onto the dance floor with a girlfriend, top hat in hand, and moved like Jagger. The album ushered in an era of ever more extravagant cover art and groundbreaking musical landscapes, with David crafting such memorable lines as "Pour me out another phone" in "Drive-In Saturday" (1973). His frolicsome moment unfolded in the very building where The Rolling Stones held their residency a decade earlier, to which The Beatles made a pilgrimage of intrigue in 1963.
In May 1974, David Bowie unveiled his eighth studio album, "Diamond Dogs." Hearing it conveyed O'Regan back to that first fleeting encounter during recording sessions in Barnes. Two weeks later, he departed on his Grand Tour of Europe - a decade touring with many of the world's greatest British musical icons, including Queen and The Rolling Stones. Two of those years were spent on tour with David Bowie himself.
In 1978, O'Regan did indeed work for the iconic music paper New Musical Express (NME) - as suggested by David - shooting Blondie, the Ramones, The Clash, Iggy Pop, and at his own request, David Bowie at Newcastle City Hall. These became his first professional photographs of The Thin White Duke. Duran Duran's John Taylor would later admire those pictures as he read his copy of NME on the bus journey to school.
David Bowie's show at Madison Square Garden in New York City in 1983 was a major cultural event. Attendees backstage and at the Café Seiyoken after-party included Andy Warhol, Keith Richards, Yoko Ono, and Tina Turner. Mick Jagger was sensitive about being photographed on his 40th birthday but posed for a jolly picture with David, which was featured in the respected publication Newsweek a few days later. David played two nights at The Garden, but Ron Delsener - the first New York promoter to book David in 1972 - believed he could have broken Elton John's record-breaking seven-night residency.
During the Serious Moonlight Tour, O'Regan photographed David backstage at the Forum in Los Angeles with Michael Jackson during their first-ever encounter. The tour was filled with spontaneous magical moments: at the Auteuil Hippodrome in Paris, an audience member threw glittering red shoes on stage, which David integrated into "Let's Dance," sashaying with a phantom partner. At Milton Keynes Bowl in England, he wove a parasol into "China Girl." David had headlined only one outdoor show prior to 1983, so European promoters were initially reluctant to book him into stadiums. However, when 250,000 applications were received for 44,000 tickets at one indoor arena in the UK, promoters worldwide fell over themselves to book larger venues.
The Milton Keynes Bowl shows in 1983 saw Bowie performing for 175,000 fans over three days as part of the Serious Moonlight tour. During the Ullevi stadium show in Gothenburg, David bowed to touch the stage, referencing a move by Steve Strange, who had appeared in Bowie's "Ashes to Ashes" video. These gestures demonstrated Bowie's attention to detail and his ability to incorporate elements from his broader artistic community into his live performances.
On June 20, 1987, a decade before Princess Diana's tragic accident in Paris, O'Regan invited his father and youngest brother Declan to David Bowie's Glass Spider show at Wembley Stadium. He escorted them on a short journey into the audience and out to the mixing desk in the center of the stadium, which afforded the best view over the crowd toward the stage. O'Regan wandered back to the dressing rooms alone, blissfully unaware that Princess Diana was on her way.
The backstage area was cleared of bystanders as Princess Diana glided into the inner sanctum, where David introduced her to each member of his band. Promoter Harvey Goldsmith had met Diana many times, and when O'Regan asked whether he could take a picture, Goldsmith replied, "Why don't you ask her yourself?" With formality apparently dispensed with, O'Regan approached the most famous woman in the world, suggesting that she pose with David. "Do you really think he'd want to?" she asked. To which O'Regan replied, "I think he would!"
Throughout their relationship, O'Regan captured Bowie in various intimate and professional moments. He photographed David playing football with musicians and crew members in Melbourne, Australia, and documented him posing for a designer at Madame Tussauds in London while she color-matched his eyes for his waxwork. In 1987, he captured Bowie during filming of a Pepsi advertisement with Tina Turner in Amsterdam, showing the star's commercial endeavors alongside his artistic pursuits.
In 1990, David hosted a press conference at the Rainbow Theatre in London to announce his Sound+Vision Tour. O'Regan attended with a view to capturing an informal portrait prior to his appearance before the press, and the resultant photographs portrayed David's naturally dapper "cheeky chappy" persona. The inspiration for O'Regan's career journey had struck 17 years prior at the Hammersmith Odeon Ziggy Stardust concert, the night before David consigned his creation to history.
During the retirement concert, which had been broadcast on TV a week earlier, O'Regan took the opportunity to tell David, "It's you that inspired me to take up photography." David's response was characteristically modest: "I bet you say that to everyone. You'll probably say it to Bono tomorrow." As O'Regan reflects, "David was the quintessential Englishman - modest and incapable of accepting a compliment."
O'Regan dropped into a few shows on the Sound+Vision Tour, primarily in the USA and Europe, including the Milton Keynes Bowl in August, where temperatures approached 100 degrees Fahrenheit. While there were photographs to be taken, it was also an expedition with family and friends. He captured the crowd from a helicopter over the venue, then introduced "Mr. Jones" to his father. David's greeting was characteristically warm: "Hello Dad!"
The photographer's relationship with Bowie continued until the very end. David's passing left O'Regan deeply saddened, a sentiment that had troubled him long before that fateful day. He sometimes dreamed of visiting his old friend at his Lafayette Street apartment in Manhattan. One evening, he lay on the bed with his nine-year-old son Rory as they immersed themselves in the affecting melodies of "Blackstar." "Will I ever get to meet David?" Rory asked. "I'm sure you will," O'Regan replied.
David Bowie slipped away in New York City in the early morning of January 10, 2016, 38 years after O'Regan had first met him bouncing across Church Road in Barnes. In tribute, Mick Jagger tweeted along with a photograph that O'Regan had taken of the two old friends together in London: "We had so many good times together. He was my friend, I will never forget him." O'Regan's comprehensive archive now stands as one of the most intimate and extensive visual records of one of music's most enigmatic figures, documenting not just the public performances but the private moments that revealed the man behind the personas.
