Jane Birkin, the Anglo-French singer and actress whose collaboration with the artist Serge Gainsbourg made her a defining figure of the 1970s and whose personal style inspired a luxury handbag, died in Paris on Sunday. She turned 76.
Her death was confirmed by President Emmanuel Macron of France, who called her “a French icon” in a message posted on Twitter. The French news media reported that Ms Birkin had been found dead in her home, but the cause was not immediately known.
It was Mrs. Birkin’s personal and artistic relationship with Mr. Gainsbourg that made her famous abroad, especially after their 1969 hit “Je t’aime… moi non plus” (“I Love You… Me Noch”). In America, Mrs. Birkin was best known for lending her name to the famous Hermès handbags, status symbols with a distinct strap closure and signature clasp.
Jane Mallory Birkin was born in London on December 14, 1946 to actress Judy Campbell and Cmdr. David Birkin of the Royal Navy. But it was her years in France that made her famous and established her as an epitome of Parisian chic.
One of her first acting roles was The Blonde in Michelangelo Antonioni’s 1966 film “Blow-Up”. It was two years later, on a film set, that Mrs. Birkin met Mr. Gainsbourg and began a love affair that would last 12 years and captivate France.
Their erotic duet “Je t’aime… moi non plus”, whose lyrics are interrupted by Mrs. Birkin’s hoarse moans, has been seen as an example of the sexual revolution of the 1960s. It was condemned by the Vatican.
After the breakdown of the Gainsbourg relationship in 1981, Mrs. Birkin continued to sing and act, including in films by Agnès Varda and Patrice Chéreau. In 1983 she released the album “Baby Alone in Babylone”, with music and lyrics by Mr. Gainsbourg.
Mr. Gainsbourg, a director and composer whose music pioneered contemporary French pop music, died in 1991 at the age of 62.
“He wrote for me from 1968 to the day he died,” Ms Birkin said in a 2018 interview with DailyExpertNews. “Why he kept asking me to interpret the songs I had inspired, I don’t know — but perhaps he knew I would at least be faithful to that.
Ms. Birkin’s sassy looks and carefree bohemian manner stunned generations of style-conscious people and inspired Hermès’ expensive and coveted Birkin bag.
“I would have loved to have been a kind of neat person and wear a Kelly,” she said in a 2018 YouTube interview, referring to the female handbag created and named after the movie star Grace Kelly. “But I never thought you could get enough of it.”
The partnership with the French luxury house Hermès began after its CEO, Jean-Louis Dumas, saw Ms Birkin struggling with a wicker basket on a flight to London, the contents spilling onto the floor. Mrs. Birkin said she couldn’t find a leather bag she liked. Hermès designed the Birkin, which, as she requested, was “four times the size of a Kelly.”
Ms. Birkin was also popular in France as an activist for women’s and LGBTQ rights and also because of her British accent when she spoke French, which the French found endearing.
“The most Parisian of the English has left us,” wrote Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo in a message on Twitter. “We will never forget her songs, her smile and her incomparable accent that have always accompanied us.”
Ms Birkin suffered a mild stroke in 2021 and had recently canceled a series of concerts due to health concerns.
She is survived by two daughters she had with Mr. Gainsbourg and the French film director Jacques Doillon: the singer-actresses Charlotte Gainsbourg and Lou Doillon, each of whom, like their mother, have inspired designers and fashion enthusiasts.
Guy Trebay contributed reporting from New York.
