three academic portraits

I may do more of these, depending on how they meet my needs to visualize the mask of entrenched power. I'm fascinated by these portraits and how they serve as emblems. In the last few years I've noticed a trend toward photographs as attempts at capturing the image (reifying the reminder) of a presence. That's what these images are, among other things: past presences.. A portrait is a haunt, a haint - as my grandmother would say. "How can we convey the power," they seem to ask? Or we could say, that they question power - a reminder that any human who may have held power, discovered its presence as fleeting - and at bottom, discovered themselves as impotent. So an academic portrait displays power and impotence at once. It takes power to have such a portrait painted and to be garbed in such a way; it displays impotence in that this is all there is - a guy in a suit.