Anti-Glamour at The New York Times Magazine

Clive Crook notes the hideousness of the NYT Mag's "Obama's People" portraits: "They look like cadavers worked over by someone fired for incompetence by Madame Tussaud's. Many of them also appear to have been dipped from the waist down in a solution of some kind....Somebody please tell me what Larry Summers ever did to deserve this. Peter Orszag, Ken Salazar and Jim Messina, I advise you to sue. Ellen Moran is going to need counselling."

This feature isn't an isolated example. The Times Magazine seems to believe that, except for fashion spreads, an interesting photo is an ugly one and that people are "themselves" when they look awkward or uncomfortable or as dorky as possible. It's the portrait as mug shot.

Yet, as I wrote here, "except for professional models, photo subjects generally expect the wedding album standard to apply: Photos should look realistic, but as attractive as possible. Anything else, whatever artistic justification the photographer or editor may put forward, feels like an ambush. Nobody voluntarily agrees to an unappealing portrait."

Given the magazine's record, no one should ever agree to a New York Times Magazine photo shoot without veto power over the resulting portraits. (Just look how unsympathetic they made their own writer look.) Yet people do agree, all the time, even people with the clout to say no.

So how did all these powerful people end up looking so bad? And how did the ones who managed to look good control their images? Did Joe Biden demand photo approval? Did Hillary Clinton? (The feature wouldn't have worked without them.) Or are they just  practiced at having their photos taken?

When he was still a senator, John F. Kennedy got photographer Howell Conant to take his picture from every conceivable angle so he'd know which ones were most flattering and could pose accordingly (my source). Good advice for the aspiring politician, or even the aspiring mid-level staffer.