Forty works from the late rock legend, David Bowie’s collection are on view at Sotheby’s in London for the next three weeks before moving on to L.A., New York and Hong Kong in the fall. The musician’s life as a collector was something he kept hidden from the view of the public. But now, nearly 300 works by artists like Damien Hirst, Henry Moore and Marcel Duchamp are auctioned off this November. Most coveted (and valuable) is Jean-Michel Basquiat’s five-and-a-half foot tall painting, Air Power, which Bowie bought in 1995. Oliver Barker, chairman of Sotheby’s Europe said,

“David Bowie’s collection offers a unique insight into the personal world of one of the 20th Century’s greatest creative spirits.“

Bowie himself told the New York Times in 1998,

“Art was, seriously, the only thing I’d ever wanted to own. It can change the way that I feel in the mornings.”

LONDON, Preview Exhibition
20 July–9 August
LOS ANGELES
September 20-21
NEW YORK
September 26-29
HONG KONG
October 12-15

Not many of us can afford the art, but the catalogue, Bowie/Collector, is a great piece of pop culture memorabilia. I’ve amassed a mini-collection of them over the years; Andy Warhol, Liberace, Jackie Kennedy, Katherine Hepburn, Michael Jackson & Marilyn Monroe to name a few. I have to add this one, but at $286 for the 3-volumn set, I might need to sell some of my own art first.

Sotheby’s is open to the public and free of charge. For more info, go here.