Who Shot Rock n Roll

Besides the fact that I live 5 short blocks from the Brooklyn Museum, I am also a fangirl of anything music related. Which makes it pretty unbelievable that it's taken me a month to get my lazy self over to the
"Who Shot Rock and Roll" exhibit, which will be on view until 1/31/10.

The exhibition is quite impressive, not so much because the photos were unique (many I had seen before), but it was more about the photographers themselves, the stories that they had to tell, or the stories behind the photos. For example, there was a polaroid of Courtney Love, taken during a shoot for "Live Through This", mere days after Kurt Cobain killed himself. Or a series of Elvis, his arms wrapped around a woman--the shots look totally staged but apparently he met this woman on the street and she dared him to kiss her, which he did (on a side note, Elvis was exceptionally gorgeous. Not news, I know, but worth mentioning!).

The photos were split up into different categories, such as behind-the-scenes; musicians before they became famous (a great one of Madonna walking down the street, snapped by Amy Arbus who recognized her from the gym but didn't necessarily know she was an up-and-coming "star"), live performances, fans, portraits, and my personal favorite, album covers!

In addition to the still images, the museum included some videos such as David Bowie "Life on Mars" directed by Mick Rock (I teared up watching that one. Such a beautiful man/alien he is!), and "One" by U2 directed by Anton Corbijn, as well as several others.

So much talent in one space-photographers such as Bob Gruen, Albert Watson, Danny Clinch, Herb Ritts, Richard Avedon (he shot a lot of album covers--who knew?), Michael Lavine, Max Vadukul, Pennie Smith, to name but a few. Here are some more images I enjoyed from the show:

Album cover art by Hipgnosis. Long before Photoshop existed-the design team actually had to go to the desert of Morocco, blow up each and every one of those red balls and photograph them. Much simpler (and more extravagant!) times!
Syd Barrett of Pink Floyd. (c) Mick Rock

John and Yoko soon before he was tragically killed (this is not the exact photo from the show, I don't believe, but one of the outtakes from the shoot. (c) Allen Tannenbaum