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It would be a great portrait in any case, but given that Gore's husband happens to be Vice President of the United States, a man of solemn office and one often assumed to lack a sense of humor, she thought it only fair to ask his permission to reprint it. He said OK -- he even OKed the photo of himself in full green Halloween makeup as Frankenstein's monster -- and the two are among the most touching of the more than 120 color and black-and-white pictures in Tipper Gore's new photographic journal of four years in the life of the Clinton-Gore administration.
Picture This: A Visual Diary began just as the title suggests, with piles of photographs and scribbled captions. "We don't have much time to write, so that's how I'm keeping my diary," Gore said. "I scribble little anecdotes on the back, put them in chronological order and it becomes a visual diary."
The photos, most of which were taken during the four years of the first Clinton Administration, range through moments intimate, formal, ceremonial, tragic, and personal. Many chronicle official visits she has made, either with her husband or as a representative of the administration, to other countries. Some are simple portraits; some are textural pieces, like the one of the Mariinsky Theater in Saint Petersburg, Russia, with its wedding-cake tiers and heavy layered lace curtain bathed in a golden light; and the stillness of the stage exaggerated by the blur of motion among the audience.
The text, written with Barbara Matusow, reflects Gore's characteristic straightforwardness and accessibility. "As I mention in the text, photography is a way for me to preserve the part of me that is only me, the true expression of myself. I have a lot of roles to play, private roles and public roles; and I would hope everyone had something that allowed them to express themselves."
But Gore, who once famously turned her own camera on a circling pack of photographers, does not deny the shield the lens provides. "Sometimes I do use it as a way of structuring my response, a way I can remain calm in a moment of historical significance or that keeps me from breaking down in the face of an emotional situation. It's helpful to me to use the camera, to do something active instead."
Picture This is neither a heavy coffee table volume nor a standard shelf size; it's about the size of a children's book, cropped on the horizontal, so to speak, and intentionally light and informal -- a tone set by the cover portrait of Gore seated on the back of a sofa with her feet firmly on the arm and her camera in the seat of honor. "I wanted the book to seem inviting and easy instead of being intimidating."
The form of the book "really was an evolution. I knew I wanted to start with Inauguration Day and cover the actual time the administration was in office; and I wanted to show how being in the administration affected our private life, work life, and public life. And I wanted to keep a light touch. But it was hard" winnowing down the negatives. "I usually know what I'm trying to capture in a picture, but sometimes on a contact sheet or even in the enlargements I find something I didn't know I'd seen."
One thing Gore does miss is doing her own printing. "I still have the darkroom at home [meaning their Arlington, VA house], and technically speaking I could go over there and do my own printing. In fact I probably should, for my own practice. It's one thing I always loved, was submerging myself in the process: coming out thinking it had been an hour and a half and discovering it had really been four and a half. But I don't have that kind of time right now." So she hired former Washington Post magazine photo editor Molly Roberts to help her edit the hundreds of contact sheets and negatives from the four years.
The photographs are revealing not only of the subjects, but of the artist as well. For instance, in the pictures which show the Gores and the Clintons together, whether in official or informal settings, their mutual affection and respect, and the strength of their working relationships, are obvious. Her sense of humor and balance sharpens a picture of Vice President Gore, with his foot in a cast and leaning on crutches, consulting with a white-suited Egyptian official, while behind them, in the foreshortened landscape, squat two ancient pyramids, also seeming bending their heads together.
Almost palpable, however, is the relief she feels when she, Al, and the children take a vacation in Colorado: The sense of freedom, the immensity of sky and river says more about the strictures of life among the Secret Service than any words. "Oh, yes!" she readily admits. "That's just how it felt. Blue sky! We loved that trip." (All the family photographs were "cleared" by her husband and children.)
Although perhaps better known for co-founding the Parents Music Resource Center which urged record companies voluntarily to label recordings containing sexually explicit or violent lyrics, Gore has long been active in mental health and homeless issues as well. She is President Clinton's advisor on mental health, and several times a month volunteers with a Washington outreach project which seeks out the homeless living on the streets. "My work with the homeless was a thread throughout the book, but I didn't want to make it too heavy," Gore says, so the portraits of homeless persons were scattered among other subjects to make a subtle point "where they seemed to fit" -- in one case, following the photographs of Rwandan refugees in neighboring Zaire. Proceeds from the sales of Picture This are being donated to the Nashville-based National Health Care for the Homeless Council, Inc.
Eve Zibart is on the staff of the Washington Post.
©1996, ProMotion, inc.