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25 years' WORK From 9 April to 25 June 2000, the Groningen Museum will present the exhibition entitled 'ANTON CORBIJN - 25 years' WORK'. This exhibition provides a retrospective of his work over the past 25 years. In addition to the well-known photographs, there is also much work that is relatively unknown. The exhibition tells the story of a Dutch youngster who developed to become one of the world's most renowned photographers in the glamorous world of the 'rich and famous'. A selection of Corbijn's oeuvre from the last 25 years will be shown, not only including the celebrated coars~grained black-and-white photographs from the 70s and BOs and his new fake documentary work with celebrities, but also album covers and video clips that simultaneously provide a picture of 25 years of pop history. This less well-known work from Corbijn's archives also includes early photographs of Bone (U2), fashion photography, and recent work in colour. Anton Corbijn, born in Strijen (1955), began his career in Groningen; he shot photographs of the pop group Solution on the Grote Markt (the central square in Groningen) in 1 972, and he registered various concerts in De Oosterpoort (cultural centre in Groningen). In 1974, he followed an eighteen-months' course in photography at the intermediate technical college n The Hague, after which he wo-ked ,'s an a~s3tant to Gijabert Hanekroot in Amsterdam. Stimulated by the prevailing punk attitude of the times, he decided to go independent in 1976, and was the chief photographer for the main Dutch pop-music magazine, OOR, for a considerable time. In 1979, he moved to London where he worked as a photographer for the British music weekly, New Musical Express (NME), for a period of five years. Important international magazines followed, including Rolling Stone, Harper's Bazaar, ELLE, and W. Selections of Corbijn's photographs have been compiled in a number of publications of which the most important are Famouz (1989) and Star Trak (1996). Both books have celebrities as their theme. Famouz is the more documentary of the two, and contains black-and-white photographs of musicians. Star Trak contains many portraits in both colour and black-and-white - of writers, models, actors, film and theatre directors, and musicians. His most recent book, 33 Still Lives (1999), consists of photographs of a mis-en-scene world of paparazz4 primarily featuring film stars. The subjects are portrayed in monochrome blue incorporating a little red as an accentuating colour. Complete generations have grown up with Corbun's pictures. The photographs of David Bowie, Miles Davis, and Captain Beefheart are known world-wide. He has been a major image-builder for U2 (due to his album covers for The Joshua Tree, Rattle&Hum, Achtung Baby, POP, for example, and also as a result of his video clips), and for Depeche Mode (with more than 15 video clips and 5 CD covers, and the designs for the stages for 2 world tours, etc.). The exhibition devotes an entire room to photographs of Bone (U2). Furthermore, Corbijn conceived more than 100 album covers for various artists, including Nick Cave, Bryan Ferry, Metallica, the Rolling Stones, REM, the Bee Goes, and John Lee Hooker. In addition to photography, Corbijn has been engaged in directing video clips of artists such as Metallica, U2, Joni Mitchell, Johnny Cash, and the Red Hot Chilli Peppers since 1 983. Additional interesting snippets: Corbijn's video clip 'Heart-Shaped Box' for Nirvana was honoured with an MTV Award in 1 994, he made a short film, entitled 'Some YOYO Stuff' with Don van VIet (alias Captain Beefheart( for the BBC, and was the image-creator in the re-election campaign of Dutch Minister President Wim Kok in 1998. Other Corbijn exhibitions |