The Bigger Picture 30 Years of Portraits

Description

“A portrait can be…’sit down and I’m taking your picture,'” says Jamie Lee Curtis, “or a portrait can be a conceptually of a person…of that moment. Not everybody gets that bigger picture.”

But Diana Walker does. As a White House photographer through five presidential administrations, she has enjoyed incomparable access to many of the world’s major political players. Going behind the scenes and photographing her subjects over the course of three decades, she has captured Presidents and their families in wonderfully candid moments, and world leaders in the course of momentous events. The result is The Bigger Picture, a rare collection of beautifully expressive images that reveal the emotional essence of every subject. Walker’s way of engaging people and inspiring their trust leads to portraits that are refreshingly spontaneous and open, giving us the feeling that we’ve met each of her subjects personally.

Many of those portrayed are well known in politics, industry, science, the arts, or entertainment, such as movie star Jamie Lee Curtis, a skilled photographer herself. We meet all the U.S. Presidents from Jimmy Carter to George W. Bush; world leaders Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin; Apple founder Steve Jobs; and foreign guests Princess Diana and Prince Charles. We see an exuberant Bill Clinton greeting a huge sea of humanity in Africa; we happen upon a chummy chat between Lynn Fontaine and Agnes de Mille, both resplendent in gorgeous gold; and we encounter Elizabeth II of England hosting the Reagans at Windsor.

Throughout The Bigger Picture, Walker and her subjects narrate many of the 200 portraits, reminiscing about the experience in background tales that range from surprising to poignant to outright hilarious. The result is a delightfully layered story, both visual and verbal, told from multiple points of view.

For everyone who’s interested in great photography, famous figures, and the political and cultural life of our times, there’s much to see and even more to discover in The Bigger Picture.