As a young person Michael Stipe first became interested in the printed image through the culture of posters that surrounded music in the 1970s.

Often folded and printed full bleed, the activity of collecting, arranging, and hanging these images became deeply personal for him, and contributed greatly to the sensibility of work he went on to do in photography as an adult--incorporating properties of both the machine and handmade, analog and digital.

The image included in this limited edition to 20 copies is titled The last time I saw River . Stipe shot it driving away from the set of the last movie that his friend River Phoenix ever made. The image is unique within the context of Volume 1 , in that it is the only picture absent of any people.