The one item that the Victoria and Albert Museum could not use in its blockbuster exhibition on David Bowie, who has died at the age of 69, was a Bakelite Grafton saxophone given to him by his father when he was only 13.
The show is currently at the Groninger Museum in the Netherlands, which was due to be closed on Monday, but opened its doors to allow fans to see the exhibition and sign a book of condolence. “We see a lot of people crying in our museum today,” said a spokeswoman.
V&A curator Geoffrey Marsh revealed that Bowie declined the request to lend the saxophone, possibly because it was quite fragile but also because it meant so much to him. “It was very poignant. Apart from that, he lent everything we asked of him,” said Marsh of the exhibition, David Bowie Is, which has become the most successful ever staged by the London museum.
More than 1.3 million people have visited the show, which opened at the V&A in 2013 before going on tour to Toronto, São Paulo, Berlin, Chicago, Paris and Melbourne. Last month the exhibition opened in the Dutch city of Groningen.
The tour will continue, the V&A said, although it is currently only confirmed to travel to Japan in 2017. Marsh said he heard the news of Bowie’s death and thought it was a hoax. “It is a huge loss … just for humanity, actually,” he added.
Bowie offered curators full access to his vast, immaculately kept archives but declined to talk to them – the show had to be the V&A’s own take on his life. “He was very generous and, in a curious way, quite self-effacing,” said Marsh. “I think he was genuinely interested in what someone else might make of it all.”
The exhibition includes more than 300 objects including album covers, videos, drawings, handwritten song lyrics and costumes, such as the Ziggy Stardust jumpsuit that Bowie wore in 1972, when he performed Starman on Top of the Pops.
After the show’s success in London, where 311,956 people visited, the V&A was inundated with requests from other museums. “Everywhere the exhibition has gone it has been phenomenally successful,” said Marsh. “Every new generation finds him of interest and I think that will continue.
“There are very few performers who engender that kind of love. There are lots of bands that people really like and admire, but the intimacy people feel with Bowie is something very, very rare. And the fact he kept doing it for 50 years is extraordinary.”
David Bowie Is continues at the Groninger Museum, Netherlands, until 13 March
