A name people around the world know and associate with the music and entertainment industry is also in fact affiliated with photography. He is popular for his songs Run To You, Heaven and not to forget Summer of 69 and Everything I Do, I Do it For You. Brian Adams is not only a Canadian musician and a song writer but an actor, producer and photographer.
Adams has been an anti-war campaigner for a long time and he published a photo book recently November, 2013, titled Wounded: The Legacy of War to draw attention to the consequences that fall upon people because of war.
His work has been published in Harper’s Bazaar, Interview, Esquire, British Vogue, i-D, L’uomo Vogue and etc. He has photographed for commercial campaigns as well for well-known companies like Sand, Montblanc, Guess, Converse, Fred Perry, John Richmond, and Escada recently.
For his fashion photography, Adams has received two Lead Awards in Germany, first in 2006 and later in 2012. Moreover, he co-founded Zoo Magazine, a fashion plus art journal, that features works of some very good fashion photographers, such as Donald McPherson, Terry Richardson, Hedi Slimane, Karl Lagerfeld, Nobuyoshi Araki, and David LaChapelle. The magazine’s head office is in Germany. Adams shoots photos for the magazine on a regular basis.
In 2012, Steidl released Bryan Adams first photographic book, titled Exposed. Previous collaborations have been for United States Calvin Klein in 2005, called American Women. The profit from this project was given to New York’s Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center to support research programs on breast cancer. In 1999, the profits of Made in Canada, for Flare Magazine, was given to Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation. These ventures not only aimed to help people but was a tribute to Donna, his friend who died from the same disease.
Adams has photographed his peers from the music industry as well, such as Mark Jagger, The Who, Shania Twain, Ray Charles, Arcade Fire, Rod Stewart, Take That, Robert Plant, Sarah McLachlan, Billy Idol, Celine Dion, Amy Winehouse, Lindsay Lohan, Bryan Ferry, Die Antwood, Lenny Kravitz, Lana Del Rey, Morrissey, Peter Gabriel, Annie Lennox and many more.
In 2000, when Adams played with The Who onstage at the Royal Albert Hall, not only a DVD of the concert was issued but Adams photos of himself and the band were also included in a booklet with the DVD. The photos were shot by Adam.
Two years later, the Commonwealth invited Adams and other photographer to take pictures of Queen Elizabeth II while she was present at her Golden Jubilee. A photograph of her taken by Adams was used in 2004 for a Canadian postage stamp. A year later, Adams shot another portrait of Prince Phillip and Queen Elizabeth II which is in London’s National Portrait Gallery.
In addition to Adams’s photography for social cause – through his work he aims to raise international awareness on hearing and its loss. For this he supports, Hear the World project.
Moving on, Adams work has been exhibited in many galleries and museums, including Toronto’s Royal Ontario Museum, 1999 and 2004; London’s Saatchi Gallery, and Montreal’s McCord Museum in 2000; Germany’s Photokina, 2001and 2006; London’s Institute of Contemporary Arts, 2004; London’s Canada House, 2005; Italy’s Tempio Di Adriano, 2006; Austria’s Leica Gallery, 2006; Spain’s PhotoEspana, 2007; New York’s 401 Projects, 2007; and many more.