At the 2010 Convention Dinner, John Swannell was awarded an Honorary
Fellowship of The Societies in recognition of his contribution to the art of
photography. Here we reproduce a feature on John, written by Trevor Lansdown
with kind permission of Calumet. All images courtesy and copyright John
Swannell.
John Swannell may be of slender stature but he’s made a big fat impact on UK
and international photography across a helter-skelter working life that has
spanned 40 years – and shows no sign of slipping softly into the photo
sidelines any time soon. Swannell (63) has pretty much done it all. But
naturally he’s far too polite to boast about any of it.
Despite his honest modesty, the truth is his name resonates effortlessly
through the same hallowed halls as iconic photo-gods such as Bailey, Penn,
Horst, Parkinson, Lategan, Avedon and Brandt. He’s the guy Princess Diana
called personally in 1994 to commission portraits of herself and the two
boys. He’s the guy who once told Valentino (most respectfully) that
unfortunately he wouldn’t be able to accept his very lucrative commission to
fly to Milan to shoot the latest fashion collection as he had promised to
look after his kids that weekend. (In the end Valentino flew the clothes and
accompanying entourage to London and Swannell did the shoot with David
Bowie’s model wife Iman – while his two kids watched enthralled, at the back
of the studio.)
He’s also the photographer that Buckingham Palace officials turned to when
they needed to deliver what was described as; ‘The most important photograph
of the royals since Queen Victoria was pictured with her family’. The image
was to mark the Queen Mother’s 100th birthday. 'Apparently there had never
been a picture of a past queen, a present queen, a future king and another
future king in one image before', enthuses Swannell. 'And they gave me
exactly 10 minutes to shoot it. That’s pressure.'
He’s the man who sipped cocktails on a yacht off the south of France with
Helmut Newton, David Bailey, Don McCullin, Lartigue and Sarah Moon – and
famously shared a joint with John Lennon while his then boss, Bailey, was
photographing Yoko in a nearby studio.
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