In his short but extraordinary life, Leigh Bowery (1961-1994) forged a truly unique path. Known variously as an artist, performer, club kid, model, TV personality, fashion designer and musician, Bowery took on many different roles, always refusing to be limited by convention. Thirty years after his death, his work remains as fascinating, shocking, comical and contentious as ever.

As Leigh Bowery!, the retrospective bringing alive his life and work, opens at Tate Modern, we present a dA-Zed Guide to this inimitable artist provocateur and polymath.

A IS FOR AUSTRALIA

While he made his name in London, Bowery actual hailed from Down Under. Born and brought up in the conservative suburb of Sunshine, Melbourne, Leigh had a happy, conventional start in life. He spent his childhood gardening, playing the piano and going to church. From a young age, he loved doing his mum’s hair, knitting and sewing. Always a ‘big lad’, by the time he went to high school, he had to carry his passport on public transport to prove he was half fare, due to his towering physique. He packed up shop in 1980, when he was barely out of his teens. “I was so itchy to see new things and to see the world, that I just left,” he explained later of his decision.

B IS FOR BURGER KING

Inspired to move to London by UK magazines like The Face and NME, not knowing any locals, Bowery joined the staff of a Burger King in the West End, favouring the night shift. He left, according to one account, because he was caught fiddling the till – in another, he quit when they offered to promote him to manager.

C IS FOR MICHAEL CLARK

The avant-garde dancer and choreographer Michael Clark was a close friend and long-term collaborator. Leigh designed and produced costumes for Clark’s company, then progressed to performing onstage or playing the piano (he trained classically as a child), alongside wardrobe duties.

D IS FOR DESIGN

Although a multi-hyphenate artist and performer, Bowery excelled at costume design. He conceived, pattern-cut and created all of his garments from scratch. Trained in fashion design at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (until he dropped out), he crafted bustle skirts, asymmetric bodysuits, low-cut bodices and Regency jackets from the cheapest fabrics available – from markets and East End textile shops, often adding thousands of sequins.

Despite showing collections on catwalks in NYC and Japan, he never started his own brand. His boredom threshold was far too low to make more than one of the same thing. He was also relentlessly anti-commercial and habitually undercharged for the pieces he sold.

E IS FOR ENEMA

In one infamous performance at an Aids benefit in the early 90s, Bowery concluded his act by turning his back to the audience, bending over and drenching the unsuspecting front row in enema water. “If I have to ask if this idea is too sick, I know I’m on the right track,” he said of the scatalogical showering.

F IS FOR FERGUS GREER

Leigh was photographed by many, but enjoyed an enduring collaboration with Fergus Greer. A 26-year-old photography assistant when they met, Greer shot so many of Bowery’s outfits in ‘Richard Avedon’ studio-style over the years, he published a book, Leigh Bowery LOOKS.

G IS FOR GAFFER TAPE

Moving beyond clothing, Bowery explored manipulating his body to create dramatic silhouettes. Gaffer tape could bind pecs to create cleavage or tuck genitals away, over which he’d glue a “merkin” wig to surprise audiences. As well as taping and cinching in, he’d use padding to exaggerate other areas – a pregnant stomach, bustle at the back or one giant, padded leg.

H IS FOR HEADWEAR

Bowery experimented widely with hats and headpieces. His body insecurities included a dissatisfaction with his face, but he progressed from heavy make-up coverage after becoming frustrated with washing the make-up stains from garments to creating masks corresponding to his outfits. Other memorable pieces included foam spikes and a frilly tulle pompom that turned his entire head into a sphere.

I IS FOR INSPIRATION

During his lifetime, Bowery remained on the margins of fashion, his work limited to himself, consulting for designers like Rifat Ozbek and Body Map and creating one-off commissions. After his death, his dazzlingly original looks regularly found their way onto the moodboards of many a designer. From Alexander McQueen to Rick Owens and Richard Quinn, his fertile imagination proved a catalyst for a subsequent generation of designers.

J IS FOR JOB CENTRE

Bowery’s best friend Sue Tilley worked in a job centre. As one of the few members of the clubbing crew to hold down a 9-5 job, she often swished around the office in a Bowery custom creation.

N IS FOR NICK KNIGHT

Knight captured Leigh on film several times. By the 90s, Knight was regularly shooting for Yohji Yamamoto and Jil Sander, when his eye was caught by Bowery, whom he described as “a piece of art”.

L IS FOR LUCIEN FREUD

Frequenting the underground London club scene as well as the upper echelons of teh art world, Bowery sat for a portrait by for Lucien Freud in 1990. Over time, Freud became a patron of Bowery’s, engaging a solicitor when Bowery was arrested for public indecency; contributing to expenses while he was ill and even paying for his body to be repatriated to Australia. Freud’s daughter, Bella, explained their friendship by saying, “They shared a detached way of looking at things and an appreciation of the extreme.” At their first meeting, Freud expected Bowery to pose in a costume, but he stripped naked. Freud never corrected him, and painted him multiple times in all his corporeal glory.

M IS FOR MINTY

In 1994, Bowery’s drag band Minty were performing at Freedom in Soho when their weekly residency was brought to a premature end after Bowery vomited vegetable soup into his bandmate’s mouth live on stage – although Bowery was allegedly “thrilled to bits” that his stunts had caused such disgust.

It may have been a fleeting residency, but a young Lee McQueen happened to be in the audience to witness the soup stunt and the performance left a lasting impression on the young designer.

N IS FOR NICOLA BATEMAN

Nicola Rainbird, née Bateman is known for being the ‘baby’ in a mind-blowing piece of performance art where Bowery ‘gave birth’ to her, complete with contractions, fake blood and a string of sausages for an umbilical cord (made more shocking by the fact that Bowery would do several numbers before the ‘birth’ so Bateman was strapped inside his clothes unnoticed for ages). Bateman assisted Bowery, sewing and sequinning his designs behind the scenes. They married in 1994 and she continues to act as the director of Bowery’s estate.

O IS FOR ANTHONY D’OFFAY EXHIBITION

Part performance art, part installation, Bowery spent a week in 1988 posing each day behind a glass screen, in full looks and make-up to the delight of the viewing public. With only a pane of glass between him and the world, Bowery could only see his reflection, but passersby could watch him unabashedly.

P IS FOR PLATFORMS (AND EXTRA SHOES)

Described by his family as a ‘big lad’ at over six-foot-three, Bowery exploited his height for shock value – his favourite quality. To further boost his physical presence, he wore stilettoes inside trainers with extra-long trousers while out during the daytime (plus a “paedophile” wig over his shaved head). On stage he wore sculptural platforms and shoes that morphed into legs which he created with his assistant Lee Benjamin.

Q IS FOR QUEUES

Stylist and designer Judy Blame said of 80s club culture; “I was working on the door of a nightclub with my friend Scarlett . . . we were shameless, there were more people stood outside Cha-Chas than inside”. Later, the dress code at Bowery’s club, Taboo, was “dress like your life depends on it or don’t bother”. Doorman, Mark Vaultier, would hold a mirror up to those waiting to enter and ask: “Would you let yourself in?”

R IS FOR REPULSION

From the lumpy obstetric bulges and the holes he carved in his cheeks, to spraying his audience with enema fluid and vomiting vegetable soup into a bandmate’s mouth on stage, repulsion is one of the animating forces behind Bowery’s work, it’s the powerful, visceral response he often sought from his audience and it’s what made him a truly transgressive artist.

S IS FOR SUE TILLEY

Bowery’s close friend and confidant, Sue Tilley, became his biographer after his death. Her frank and hilarious (then heartbreaking) account of his life, Leigh Bowery The Life and Times of an Icon has been out of print for a few years. Happily, Thames and Hudson are issuing a new edition to coincide with the Tate retrospective.

T IS FOR TABOO

Taboo, often cited as the most hedonistic nightclub of all time, was a drug and alcohol-fuelled extravaganza held in a ‘delightfully tacky’ venue off Leicester Square. Bowery presided, each week appearing in a more outrageous outfit than the last. He was known for jumping up and down, wrestling and rugby tackling people on the dancefloor. Designer, Rachel Auburn, admitted finding his presence “terrifying” and running in the opposite direction before “he could pick me up by my ankles”. 

U IS FOR UNACCEPTABLE

Bowery did several things that are unacceptable by today‘s standards and even the standards of the day; he once wore blackface – emulating a golliwog – and another time wore a brown and white checked cropped smock-top adorned with swastikas, pushing the boundaries of respectability and, well, morality. Like many of his radical contemporaries, the unacceptable aspects of Bowery’s work present a problem for curators and critics to negotiate. Sofia Vranou, academic and author of an upcoming book on Leigh Bowery’s creative practice and cultural impact, recently told Dazed, “It certainly is a concern, how art deemed provocative can be best presented in [a] public space without losing its critical edge, considering at the same time potential problematic aspects of the work, or ethical implications that might arise.” This is certainly difficult when considering an artist like Bowery, who sought to shock and provoke.

V IS FOR VODKA

Despite the booze-drenched 80s Soho club scene, Bowery wasn’t much of a drinker. Nonetheless, he prepared for every night out with vodka to anaesthetise himself against the discomfort of the gaffer tape body modifications (no mixer as he’d be unable to wee all night with his penis taped up).

W IS FOR WEST END

Soho has never gone away, but during the 80s and 90s it was a creative, fashion hub. Everyone in fashion knew everyone else and partied hard. Soho housed the best clubs and bars, plus fabric shops, fashion PRs and nearby Central Saint Martins (then on Charing Cross Road).

X IS FOR EXTREME

London designer, Rifat Ozbek, said of Leigh; “If you were going to make something short, he’d want to make it very, very short. For something long, it had to have a train on it. Nothing in between.” Other extremes Leigh went to included dangling naked upside down on stage, penis clamped with clothes pegs, while smashing through a plate glass window.

Y IS FOR GONE TOO YOUNG

His death in 1994 was shocking and unexpected as Leigh was so young – only 33 – and so vibrant only weeks earlier. He’d concealed his diagnosis from everyone apart from Sue Tilley and Nicola until the last minute, suggesting they tell people he’d moved to Papua New Guinea to explain his absence after his passing. The Aids epidemic of the 80s and 90s lacks a modern day parallel – a huge number of gay men lost their lives rapidly, decimating a generation.

Z IS FOR ZIPS

With his zip-through balaclavas and PVC undergarments, there’s more than a touch of BDSM about Bowery’s designs. But the way Bowery hijacked the codifiers of this subversive sexual style (with incongruous chintzy fabrics and body modification etcetera) has profoundly influenced generations of designers, including Rick Owens, Charles Jeffrey, Richard Quinn, Gareth Pugh and, of course, Alexander McQueen.

Leigh Bowery! will be at Tate Modern from 27 February till August 31, 2025. Dazed readers can find out how to claim their 2-for-1 tickets here.