Everyone knows who the Queen of Pop is: Madonna - style icon, headline-grabber, entrepreneur and mother. For her 60th birthday, we look back on the career of the most successful woman in music history.
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The many faces of Madonna
We take a look at Madonna's unique career, the many faces she's presented to the world, her wild, iconic stage outfits, her forays into acting and her charity work.
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The urchin
Madonna Luise Ciccone has presented many versions of herself over her over 40-year career. The hit "Like a Virgin" catapulted her to superstardom in 1984 (above). At the MTV Music Awards in that same year, she stepped out of a wedding cake to that song, dressed in a bridal gown, dancing lasciviously and then rolling on the floor in a suggestive pose.
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The Gaultier muse
Madonna has never cared for convention, especially when it comes to fashion. With her sexy and provocative reputation, it's no wonder that she was drawn to another "enfant terrible," like French fashion designer Jean Paul Gaultier. He designed some of her stage outfits, including the legendary cone-shaped bustier.
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The actress
Madonna's acting career hasn't always been spectacular. She won several Golden Raspberry awards for particularly bad acting. In 1990, she starred alongside Warren Beatty in the film "Dick Tracy" and earned acclaim playing the role of Breathless Mahoney. Inspired by the movie, she recorded the album "Breathless" with its mega hit-single "Vogue."
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The sex bomb
In no time at all, Madonna had become a superstar, and she continued to focus hard on her career, including leaning into a tendency towards a sexy self-portrayal and exhibitionism. The 1991 documentary "Madonna: Truth or Dare" chronicled her tours and private life. A few years later, "Sex," a collection of erotic photos of Madonna, sold millions of copies.
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The enlightened one
Madonna reinvented herself over and over again. In 1998, "Frozen" from the Grammy-winning album "Ray of Light" was released. Madonna dropped the Gaultier outfits, lascivious dancing and erotic allusions. Having just given birth to her first child, she presented herself as more thoughful and spiritual than ever before.
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The public kisser
Madonna never completely lost her erotic bent. At the 2003 MTV Video Music Awards, she kissed her colleague Christina Aguilera and fellow pop star Britney Spears (above) onstage. In 2015, a short video clip showed her publicly kissing Canadian rapper Drake. He didn't seem too excited.
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The wife
Madonna called her first husband, actor Sean Penn, the "coolest man in the universe" and dedicated her album "True Blue" to him. The marriage lasted four years. In 1996, she had her daughter, Lourdes with her personal trainer and boyfriend, Carlos Leon. In 2000, she married British filmmaker Guy Ritchie (above); the couple had a son, Rocco. The marriage lasted eight years.
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The mom
Madonna didn't stop at two biological children: In 2006, she visited the African country of Malawi, met 13-month-old David at an orphanage, and adopted the boy. Back in Malawi in 2009, she adopted Mercy, and the twins Estere and Stella followed in 2017, completing the family.
Image: Peter Foley/epa/dpa/picture-alliance
The charity lady
Madonna founded the Raising Malawi organization in 2006 to support people in one of the world's poorest countries. She's invested millions in education and health projects there. This image from 2013 shows her with her Malawi-born adoptive children, David and Mercy.
Image: Amos Gumulira/AFP/Getty Images
The pop star
Madonna's career has always been accompanied by gossip, scandals and ups and downs. Written off by critics more than once, she has always returned to the stage to great success, like on the 2015 Rebel Heart Tour (above). She is scheduled to go on tour in Europe as of October 2023.
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Madonna approached her 60th birthday in typically mocking style. She appeared in a photo on Twitter earlier this week, dressed to the nines, with half-eaten piece of cake in her mouth.
"Three more days... Let's all have cake!" she wrote, apparently having temporarily lost her manners.
It seems the Queen of Pop — Madonna Louise Ciccone — born August 16, 1958 in Bay City, Michigan, has no plans to ignore what for many is a day they dread.
With some 335 million records sold and a fortune estimated at more than $1 billion (€880 million), Madonna is the music business' most successful woman. Even more importantly, she's become the first woman to dominate the male world of pop.
Turning heads, ignoring boundaries and breaking new ground is what Madonna's career has been all about. Breaking several taboos in her music videos — think of the black Jesus in "Like a Prayer" and the explicit postures in "Erotica" — Madonna has always known how to court publicity — by causing a stir.
But she is also an entrepreneur, writer, director, producer and designer. And while her acting career may have struggled to take off, she still won a Golden Globe for her role as "Evita" in the 1997 movie version of the musical.
The mother of two biological and four adopted children lives in Lisbon, Portugal and spends much of her time helping her offspring fulfil their own dreams. Her 12-year-old son David wants to become a professional football player, and she thinks he'll stand more of a chance in Cristiano Ronaldo's home country than in the United States.
Wherever she goes, she always takes inspiration from local culture. As she recently revealed to the fashion magazine "Vogue," she recently recorded new songs inspired by the Portuguese fado folk tradition. Her fourteenth studio album will be released later this year.
In our picture gallery (above), we look back on a great career and on Madonna's uncanny ability to eternally reinvent herself.
