Winston Churchill, Sophia Loren portraits on display
Portraits of the 20th century’s most famous faces, from Winston
Churchill to Sophia Loren, are to go on display in an exhibition of
works by the legendary photographer Yousuf Karsh.
By Anita Singh, Showbusiness Editor
Daily Telegraph/UK
Last Updated: 1:32PM GMT 02 Nov 2008
The Armenian-born Karsh died in 2002 after a career which spanned more
than 70 years.
It was Karsh who took the iconic and much-reproduced image of Churchill
in 1941. The Prime Minister had just addressed the Canadian Parliament
and Karsh recalled: "He was in no mood for portraiture and two minutes
were all that he would allow me as he passed from the House of Commons
chamber to an ante-room. Two niggardly minutes in which I must try to
put on film a man who had already written or inspired a library of
books, baffled all his biographers, filled the world with his fame, and
me, on this occasion, with dread."
Churchill posed wih a cigar and stared at the camera "as he might
regard the German enemy", Karsh said. When the photographer told him to
remove the cigar "the Churchillian scowl deepened, the head was thrust
forward belligerently, and the hand placed on the hip in an attitude of
anger."
However, the Prime Minister was impressed and later told Karsh: "You
can even make a roaring lion stand still to be photographed." The
photographer titled the portrait The Roaring Lion.
Karsh photographed the likes of Fidel Castro, Nikita Krushchev and Pope
John Paul II, but also understood how to capture glamour and beauty on
camera. His subjects included Sophia Loren, Audrey Hepburn, Brigitte
Bardot and a young Jacqueline Kennedy.
The exhibition opens at the Camera Press Gallery in central London on
November 7.