Today the world went into a state of mourning when the news broke of the death of legendary musician David Bowie. The musical maverick passed away yesterday after an 18-month battle with cancer.
Fans have since been sharing this gif of the changing faces of Bowie through the years as a tribute to the artist:
The gif is the work of illustrator Helen Green and was created a year ago to mark the musician’s 68th birthday. It quickly went viral, resulting in Green being contacted by Bowie’s people.
In a post on Bowie’s official Facebook page, Green said she makes a piece every year on his birthday, as a “little token of appreciation for someone that has inspired me so much”.
Each pencil drawing was coloured digitally and animated in Photoshop, and [it] took around 35 hours in total. For many of the drawings, I used a reference from a different year, but facing the correct way. For example, the reference for Ashes to Ashes Bowie was his 1976 mugshot, and a sideways facing Heroes Bowie for the drawing of David Jones. It was quite a triumph to see all 29 drawings in motion for the first time.