Anton Corbijn and Joy Division: Photography, Memory and Control
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Joy Division occupies a particular place in Corbijn’s story because the relationship crosses several forms of memory: the photograph made while a band existed, the images through which that band is subsequently remembered, and the dramatic reconstruction of a life in Control. Those forms are related, but they are not interchangeable.
The photograph that turns away
Corbijn’s 1979 photographs of Joy Division belong to the beginning of his life in England. Fotografiska’s account places his first session within ten days of his arrival. (Fotografiska Berlin) In his own recollection, the idea of photographing the band walking away in a tube station was his; the band liked the resulting picture. (Focus Features)
The image’s enduring fascination can be approached through a simple reversal. Publicity normally makes a performer available to the viewer. Turning bodies away interrupts that availability. The picture asks the viewer to follow rather than merely recognise. A passageway becomes a direction of travel, and the distance between the photographer and the group becomes part of the subject.
This is a reading of the image, not evidence that Corbijn intended to predict anything about the band’s future. Retrospective knowledge can make a photograph appear prophetic. A careful account should resist that temptation. A picture made in 1979 cannot be treated as if its maker already knew the subsequent history.
The problem of the definitive image
When one photograph becomes the preferred shorthand for an artist, its success can narrow our imagination. The mood of a frame can come to stand for the entire personality of everyone in it. That is particularly consequential when the surrounding story includes an early death.
The alternative is to keep the photograph specific. Look at its arrangement, not just its reputation. Ask what it gives us and what it withholds. A still image can show a gesture and establish an atmosphere; it cannot furnish a complete psychological account of its subjects. This distinction is central to writing responsibly about both Corbijn and Ian Curtis.
Returning through cinema
Control was released in 2007. Matt Greenhalgh’s screenplay drew on Deborah Curtis’s memoir Touching from a Distance, and Sam Riley played Ian Curtis. Corbijn credited cinematographer Martin Ruhe’s contribution and explained that rehearsals developed into the actors performing the music themselves. (Focus Features)
The move from portraiture to drama changes the obligation to the person being represented. A memorable pose is no longer enough. Characters need relationships, conflicting demands and time in which to behave. The viewer must encounter domestic life and ordinary activity as well as performance. The cinematic portrait becomes a sequence of pressures rather than a single defining expression.
Corbijn’s connection to the band gives the film a powerful point of entry, but it does not make a dramatisation identical to documentary evidence. The film belongs beside the photographs and memoir, not above them as a replacement for every other account.
How to approach this chapter of the work
Compare three things: the early portrait, a recorded performance by the actual band, and a performance recreated in Control. Each answers a different question. The portrait organises our gaze; the performance preserves an event; the dramatisation interprets experience through acting, framing and editing.
The reward of the comparison is not to decide that one form is the only truthful one. It is to become more alert to the different kinds of truth an image can propose. Corbijn’s importance here lies partly in making the image memorable, and partly in prompting us to reconsider what that memory contains.
View the museum’s contextual selection and Corbijn’s interview before moving to the cinema chapter. (Fotografiska Berlin) (Focus Features)