Framed KARSH PORTRAIT PHOTOGRAPH of Winston Churchill

Description

Yousuf Karsh’s iconic portrait of a scowling Winston Churchill (“The Roaring Lion”) was taken 30 December 1941 in an ante-room of the Ottawa House of Commons following Churchill’s address to the Canadian Parliament. As official biographer Sir Martin Gilbert wrote in his own memoir, IN SEARCH OF CHURCHILL, Churchill was, at the time, “in [a] happy mood… He had just made a successful speech [‘Some chicken… some neck’]. He had left the parliamentary chamber smiling… Karsh had hoped for something stern and warlike. To secure the picture he wanted, he went up to Churchill and plucked the cigar out of his mouth. ‘By the time I got back to my camera,’ Karsh later recalled, ‘[Churchill] looked so belligerent he could have devoured me. It was at that instant that I took the picture.’”

This majestic example was printed at the largest size that Karsh employed during his lifetime (16 x 20 inches). The print is signed by the photographer in ink on the lower left corner of the white border beneath the image. The photograph is museum matted and spectacularly framed (29 x 23 inches overall).