Dutch photographer, music video director and film director Anton Johannes Gerrit Corbijn van Willenswaard was born in Strijen, the Netherlands. His father was a parson in the Dutch Reformed Church. The family moved to Hoogland in 1966 and Gorningen in 1972. His younger brother Maarten Corbijn is also a photographer and film director.

Corbijn’s career as a music photographer began around 1975 in Groningen. Corbijn saw the Dutch musician Herman Brood perform in a café and began to take photographs of Brood and his band. The photographs contributed to an increase in Brood’s fame and provided exposure for Corbijn as a photographer. The New Musical Express (NME) started to feature Corbijn’s portraits of rock musicians from the late 1970s. Corbijn was also a regular contributor to The Face magazine.

Corbijn is best known for his black and white photography, but began working in colour in 1989. His first colour portraits were of Siouxie Sioux. Corbijn has photographed many musicians and actors, but he is most associated with the Irish rock band U2, particularly his photographic work for their albums The Joshua Tree and Achtung Baby in the late 1980s and early 1990s. He directed a number of music videos for the band. Corbijn was also creative director for the visual output of the British band Depeche Mode, including photography and music videos.

Corbijn directed his first music video in 1983, for the German new wave band Palais Schaumberg. Between 1983 and 2017 he directed 82 music videos.

Corbijn’s experience of directing music videos led to his first short film, a 1994 documentary for the BBC about American singer-songwriter and artist Captain Beefheart. He made his first feature film in 2007, the biopic Control, about the life and death by suicide of Joy Division singer Ian Curtis. His other films include The American (2010), starring George Clooney, A Most Wanted Man (2014), and Life (2015), about the friendship between photographer Dennis Stock and actor James Dean.