There were many photos in the "Who Shot Rock and Roll?" collection that captured my attention but one in particular stood out to me and it was the photo taken of U2 that was used for the cover of their "Joshua Tree" album. I am probably showing my age, but this was one of my favorite albums when I was a teenager. (I believe it was released in 1987, so I was almost 14...) I was a huge U2 fan and I remember hanging a poster of this photo on the wall in my bedroom. Though I still enjoy the music, I haven't thought of this photo since I was much younger so it was interesting to see it hanging somewhere other than over my bed - in this case, on the wall in an art gallery!
The photograph was taken in late 1986 by Anton Corbijn who did quite a lot of photography work for U2. It was taken in the Mojave Desert in California over the course of a several day photo shoot. It is a black and white shot taken with a panoramic camera to capture the desert landscape of the area they were in. I did a little research on the photo after my museum visit and it was interesting to learn that Corbijn had little to no experience with a panoramic camera before taking this photo so he didn't know how to focus it. As a result of this inexperience and the natural lighting used, the result was a photo in which the band is slightly out of focus while the landscape is clearly focused. I love the way the photo places the band in the rugged terrain of the desert. It is like they are part of their surroundings while being a million miles away at the same time. The positioning of the band members, their clothing, their expressions, etc all mirror the rough, harsh element that is present in the terrain itself. All in all, a classic U2 photo...in my opinion.
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