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Pop queen Kylie goes on show at British museum
2006-11-06
Soap star, pop princess and now art icon. Kylie Minogue is to become the first pop star to have an exhibition dedicated to her at Britain's venerable Victoria and Albert Museum. The exhibition illustrates why chameleons like Minogue and Madonna manage to stay at the top in a notoriously fickle business where fashions change at such bewildering speed. "This is our first exhibition dedicated to a pop star," a spokeswoman at Britain's top museum for the decorative arts told Reuters. "We felt it was great to launch it because the V and A is a museum of fashion and design. It is interesting to see how she has crafted her image using her wardrobe." The exhibition, which the museum hopes the Australian star will open next February when her world tour comes to Britain, highlights how much her image has changed. On display are the overalls she wore as Charlene in the Australian soap opera "Neighbours" in 1988 which first put her in the public spotlight alongside the gold lame hotpants she sported in the video for her 2000 hit single "Spinning Around." The exhibition was created and designed by the Arts Center in her hometown of Melbourne and includes material that she has donated herself. Grammy Award-winning Minogue returns to the stage in Australia on November 11 to resume the tour she was forced to abandon last year after being diagnosed with breast cancer. The 38-year-old singer underwent successful surgery in Melbourne in May 2005 and a course of chemotherapy in Paris where her French actor boyfriend Olivier Martinez has a home. She has just launched her first children's book, joining Madonna and a long list of celebrities penning tales for the young. In an interview with Reuters in September after attending a Dolce and Gabbana fashion show in Milan, the petite pop diva promised to wear her trademark glittery outfits on the forthcoming tour. Sitting on a bench between designers Stefano Gabbana and Domenico Dolce, she said it was great to be "with guys I know and love and to be creative again." The exhibition, which will display dresses and hats from her nine tours, is part of a growing trend in the British capital to put on shows devoted to pop stars. The National Portrait Gallery is displaying photographs and album covers from The Pet Shop Boys and Proud Galleries' Camden gallery has an exhibition dedicated to the group Queen's flamboyant frontman Freddie Mercury who died of AIDS in 1991.
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