Chatting the Pictures
Chatting the Pictures with Pete Souza: Presidential Photos in a Health Crisis
Watch and listen as Pete Souza joins us for a special three-part edition in the shadow of COVID-19. We discuss four of Pete’s photos drawn from his tenure as Chief Official White House photographer for Barack Obama and official White House photographer for Ronald Reagan.
Photo 1 and 2: President Obama mobilizing against the Ebola virus.
The first photo, taken October 24th, 2014, features Obama hugging Dallas nurse Nina Pham in the Oval Office 13 days after she recovered from the Ebola virus. The second photo, taken five weeks later on December 2, 2014, highlights President Obama and Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, touring the Vaccine Research Center at the National Institute of Heath in Bethesda, Maryland. Both photos prominently feature Dr. Fauci.
The Full Edit
Take a closer look at some of the images from our larger photo edit.
Photo: Pete Souza/White House
Caption: President Barack Obama visits with Nina Pham, a Dallas nurse diagnosed with Ebola after caring for an infected patient in Texas, in the Oval Office, Oct 24, 2014. Pham is virus-free following treatment at the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. Pham is accompanied by HHS Secretary Burwell, Pham’s mother Diana Pham, sister Catherine Pham, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Pham’s primary doctor Dr. Richard Davey, Jr., Dr. Cliff Lane of NIH and Dr. Ronny Jackson, White House Medical Unit.
Photo: Pete Souza/White House
President Barack Obama tours a lab at the Vaccine Research Center at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, Dec. 2, 2014. Dr. Nancy Sullivan, Senior Investigator, Chief Biodefense Research Section leads a tour of lab activities that led to the Ebola vaccine.
Photo by Pete Souza/White House
President Barack Obama visits wounded warriors at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, Oct. 10, 2011.
Photo: Pete Souza/White House.
Contact sheet from President Reagan’s visit to the National Institute of Health. The appearance took place during the AIDS epidemic on July 23, 1987.
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An analyst of news photos and visual journalism, and a frequent lecturer and writer on visual politics, photojournalism and media literacy, Michael is the founder and publisher of Reading the Pictures.
Communication Professor, University of Illinois. Author of Making Photography Matter: A Viewer’s History from the Civil War to the Great Depression and Picturing Poverty: Print Culture and FSA Photographs. Moderator, Reading the Pictures Salon.
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