How legendary photographer Anton Corbijn found the ‘promised land’

The oldest son of a preacher, Anton Corbijn grew up in a religious island community in the Netherlands – far from the revolutionary cultural scenes where he’d later make his name as a photographer. “Across the border from the island was the ‘promised land,’” he says. “That’s where music was made. It was a different, freer life. I elevated the idea of a liberal lifestyle, as opposed to the lifestyle I had.”

For Corbijn, the camera was a route out of the place where he grew up, to get closer to the musicians and their liberated way of living. 50 years later, he’s worked with many of the most important artists of our age, from Björk to Joy Division, Nirvana to Depeche Mode, Kate Bush to Captain Beefheart and David Bowie. But in 2001 he briefly returned to his hometown, taking time to reflect on its place in his life and career to that date. The resulting photo series, titled Staged, sees the photographer himself dress up as dead music idols, including Elvis Presley, Kurt Cobain, and John Lennon.

“I combined the obsession I had with music [and] my parents’ obsession with life after death,” he explains. The intent was “playful” and never actually meant to deceive, but it helped shape a new mythology for the village nevertheless. “We had an exhibition in the town hall,” he adds, “and I heard people saying, ‘Gee, I didn’t realise Bob Marley was in our village!’”

There are some photographers who can show us our favourite celebrities (musicians, actors, artists, models, and so on) in a totally new light. Then, there are photographers who shape how we see those icons to begin with, who help write their foundational myths. Anton Corbijn is among the latter. Picture many of the famous faces he’s worked with over the last 50 years, and there’s a good chance you’ll see them as imagined through his lens: Nick Cave frowning in a raw black-and-white portrait, a moonlit Courtney Love in the shadowy Atlantic ocean, Patti Smith turning her own camera on the viewer.

“For five decades, Anton Corbijn’s visual language has found expressions through photography, feature films, graphic design, music videos, stage design, books, and more,” says Pauline Benthede, global vice president of exhibitions at Fotografiska, opening a career-spanning retrospective of Corbijn’s work at the Stockholm gallery to celebrate its 15th anniversary. “He is an artist who has changed popular culture as we know it.”

Since its opening in 2010, Stockholm’s Fotografiska has hosted exhibitions of Corbijn’s work on three occasions – the photographer himself says the gallery feels like a “second home” by now. On the flipside, Corbijn’s work has had a ripple effect on the culture of the city itself. Born and raised in Stockholm, the 32-year-old photographer Noah Agemo used to skip school to visit Fotografiska. “I’ve never really been good at school,” he tells Dazed in his studio. “So I got a year’s [Fotografiska] membership, and I just went there like every day... That’s when I saw Anton’s first exhibition.” He was particularly affected by a photo of the trip-hop musician, and early member of Massive Attack, Tricky, with a butterfly on his chest. “I was like, ‘Wow, I didn’t know you could do that with musicians,’” he says. “I was like, ‘Maybe I can do that as well.’”

Over a decade later, a stack of Corbijn’s photo books still occupy a prime spot in Agemo’s studio, among the younger artist’s paintings and photographs – including portraits of a new generation of music stars, captured over 15 years of non-stop touring. On another wall, he’s pinned a series of photos from his hometown, which is set to feature in an upcoming exhibition of emerging photographers at Fotografiska, as part of its ongoing commitment to light up younger talent in the glow of big names like Corbijn, Cindy Sherman, and Shepard Fairey.

For Agemo, this is a full-circle moment, but does Corbijn’s latest show also inspire him to think about where his career might take him next – or what it might feel like, 50 years down the line, to stop and look back on what he’s made? “Yeah, when you look back at all the stuff that you’ve done and it fits in a room... it’s so weird,” he says. “When you do it, it feels really big, you have the energy. But when you put everything together, it’s like, ‘This is what it was. This is my whole career.’ I imagine it being a mix of feelings. I imagine it being quite difficult, and quite fun as well.”

Of course, Corbijn has actually lived this experience, squeezing the best of five decades – including the mock-paparazzi shots of 33 Still Lives (1999), a short film with David Lynch and Captain Beefheart, and numerous music videos with the likes of Depeche Mode, Joy Division, and U2 – into a few gallery rooms. Necessarily, this meant killing some darlings.

“Elimination is difficult,” Corbijn admits. “But you reach a balance.” And this isn’t just about representing the breadth of his work since the 1970s, through all of its various eras. Art also needs “room to breathe” he suggests, just as a young Corbijn found room to breathe through the medium of photography itself, and will no doubt inspire many young creatives to carve out a space for themselves in the years and decades to come.

Corbijn, Anton is on view at Fotografiska Stockholm until October 12.