American Politicians: Photographs from 1843 to 1993

American Politicians presents a marvellous collection of images, from Mathew Brady’s indelible portraits of Abraham Lincoln to the carefully staged “photo opportunities” of today. Among them are icons of political photography – Calvin Coolidge wearing a Native American headdress, Fiorello La Guardia reading comics over the radio, Harry Truman playing piano for Lauren Bacall, Lyndon Johnson displaying the scar from his surgery. Also reproduced are many rare photographs of both prominent and obscure practitioners of the rites of American politics, caught unrelentingly by the camera. The pictures have been selected from an array of public and private collections, including those of the Smithsonian Institution, the Library of Congress, the Museum of the City of New York, the New-York Historical Society, the Chicago Historical Society. The Museum of Modern Art, New York, and the archives of photo agencies, newspapers, and magazines.
Many of the photographs in this book are the work of professional news photographers, but after World War II, independent artists offered alternative views, represented here by the photographs of Robert Frank in the 1950s, Garry Winogrand and Elliott Erwitt in the 1960s, Larry Fink in the 1970s, and Judith Joy Ross in the 1980s. Despite unceasing advances in visual technology, which simultaneously aid and hinder photographers, and despite the best efforts of political handlers, both newsmen and independents continue to make the pictures that help to create and confirm the image of ourselves we see reflected in our politicians.