Bono and wife Ali Hewson are making their first commercial ad appearance in the Louis Vuitton Core Values campaign, which supports Al Gore’s The Climate Project. Photographed by Annie Leibovitz, the U2 singer and fashion designer wife are stepping off a small plane on the African savannah.

At this point, the campaign strikes off in a new direction from past appearances by a long list of notables including Catherine Deneuve, Mikhail Gorbachev and Sean Connery have all posed for the campaign, as well as Francis Ford Coppola with his daughter Sofia, and Andre Agassi with wife Steffi Graf.

Bono and Hewson aren’t wearing clothes from Louis Vuitton but Edun, the organic and ethical label created by Hewson in 2005. Louis Vuitton’s parent company LVMH now owns 49 percent of Edun, and the two powerhouses have joined forces to create a limited-edition version of the Louis Vuitton monogrammed Keepall 45.

Each bag carries a hard-crafted charm created in Kenua by fairtrade jewelry label MADE, the brainchild of Cristina Cisilino and her partner Gerson Barnett. These select Keepall 45s also come with a plaque carrying the inscription ‘Every journey begins in Africa.’

All proceeds from the sale of the piece, along with the couple’s fee for the shoot, will be donated to Technoserve in Africa for the Conservation Cotton Initiative and to the Chernobyl Children International.

Here is a short video of the Louis Vuitton ad shoot with Annie Leibovitz.

The couple has long worked to improves lives in Africa through the RED campaign and numerous other initiatives. Researching TechnoServe, we find a recent report from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation on their grant to TechnoServe with the goal of helping 182,000 farmers in East Africa to sell premium coffee.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is also working with TechnoServe to develop a Soy industry in Southern Africa.

During Paris Fashion Week, Vuitton and Edun will showcase Africa Rising, a temporary exhibition of contemporary African art to be shown with Edun’s spring collection. The Africa Rising exhibition will run October 5 until October 17.

Anne of Carversville has written at length about Edun, the RED campaign and Bernard Arnault, head of LVMH who perhaps best exemplifies the evolving Cultural Creatives mindset in luxury retailing. After links to these stories, we share prior photos from the Louis Vuitton Core Values campaign.

More about Louis Vuitton Core Values campaign: See website.

Read also Sept. 10, 2010 update: Edun Brand | Reality Check for Bono-Hewson Africa Strategy