Actress, Singer, and Style Icon Jane Birkin Dies at 76
Jane Birkin, the English actress and singer who found fame in France, has died at age 76. France's Culture Ministry first broke the news, calling Birkin a "timeless Francophone icon." French media reported she was found dead at her Parisian home this morning.
Birkin was still performing, and in May, canceled concerts for unspecified health reasons. "I've always been a big optimist, and I realize that I still need a little time to be able again on stage and with you," she wrote at the time.
Born in 1946 in Marylebone, London to Judy Campbell, an English actress, and David Birkin, a Royal Navy lieutenant commander, she described herself as a "shy English girl" growing up. In her early twenties, she began acting, and after a role in Slogan, a French film, she relocated to the country—French audiences quickly became fond of her accented French.
In 1969, she released a song "Je t'aime... moi non plus" with Serge Gainsbourg, whom she met on the set of Slogan. "If someone knows who I am it is not because of my films or my music. It is because I was attached to something, to Serge. I've done nothing definitively wonderful in my life and I don't mind that," she said in 2006.
Over the course of her life, Birkin became a style icon—and inspired a world-famous bag. In 1984, Hermès produced a leather tote that was named for her. Years later, she would say, "I love it, but I lug so much stuff around in it that I believe it is part of the reason I have tendonitis." She's also known for her political activism, including, last year, cutting off her hair in support of protestors in Iran.
Anne Hidalgo, Paris's mayor, wrote on Twitter, "Jane Birkin, the most Parisian of the English has left us. We will never forget his songs, his laughter or his incomparable accent that have always accompanied us. All my thoughts to her family, to those who loved her. And they are many."
Birkin is predeceased by one daughter, Kate Barry, who died in 2013. She is survived by two daughters, Charlotte Gainsbourg and Lou Doillon.
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