Diamond Dancing Dolls I and II are double-layered lithographs which celebrate the iconic figure of David Bowie. The work is based on a series of Narielwalla’s signature collage images and explores themes of adornment, identity and transformation. Bowie was ‘fascinated by the relationship between artifice and authenticity’. The singer’s shape-shifting ability to project different personas through dress, make-up and performance is the subject of these images. At their basis these dancing dolls explore the desire to transform into another self by working over a repeated template of Bowie’s ‘Ziggy’ face and his dancing figure, each of which is defined by highly elaborate, decorative costuming. Cipher-like, the embellished figures carry references to the gender-fluid traditions of kabuki and onnagata, which were an influence on Bowie’s approach to challenging conventions about identity and sexuality.