By Rose Simpson
Photos courtesy of Jean-Marc Carisse
Jean-Marc Carisse had his first brush with celebrity when one of his photos appeared on the front page of the Ottawa Citizen when he was six years old.
“I had fallen some 50 feet down our apartment stairwell and miraculously survived,” recalls the photographer to three Canadian prime ministers, and author of a new book, CANADA’S PHOTOGRAPHER ON THE WORLD STAGE, that will be released in March.
Jean-Marc recounts in the book that the fall in 1951, and barely surviving a fire in 1980, left him with deep psychological scars that have dogged him over a five-decade, storied career covering politicians, entertainers, sports stars and celebrities.
“I never sought treatment for my traumatic experiences other than pain relievers but I would ignore the symptoms,” he writes in his very personal memoir. “Migraines and PTSD would affect me throughout my life and my photographic career.”
On one trip with Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, he recalls sleeping in a secured luggage room rather than in a comfy bed because his room was located some 50 floors up in an open, atrium-style hotel. The atrium presented an eerie reminder of his childhood fall and gave him disturbing flashbacks.
Jean-Marc has developed many coping mechanisms to get him through his worst days. Now in his 70s, he still enjoys working and stays active exercising and as a new grandfather. After a lifetime of pick-up hockey, he feels blessed with good genes.
“I regrettably may have had to skip an activity (because of the migraines), but I don’t recall ever missing a class, work or a sport unless the pain became unbearable.”
In fact, he has earned a BA from the University of Ottawa, the Queen’s Golden Jubilee Medal and a Library and Archives Scholar Award.
His new book is a testament to living a life full of love, laughter and good fortune. As a teenager and admitted “dreamer,” he was heavily influenced by his mother’s California relatives who visited his family in the late 50s with tales of the American dream. Their stories instilled in him an early passion for travel and adventure, and dreams of a Jack Kerouac life on the road.
He spent years venturing back and forth across the U.S. and Canada, armed with a camera.
“My mother encouraged me to bring our family camera whenever I travelled, to capture images to share with our family,” he says.
After graduating from the University of Ottawa, including courses in art, cinema and photography, Jean-Marc applied for a job on Parliament Hill to work as a researcher for the National Liberal Caucus.
Dan Aykroyd, 1990s.
“There was no staff photographer in Pierre Trudeau’s office in the late 60s and 70s,” he says. “I was asked to bring samples of my work and my career took a sudden shift to full-time photography.”
In time, Jean-Marc earned his rightful spot as the official photographer to three prime ministers: Pierre Trudeau, John Turner, and Jean Chrétien. He documented those years in a coffee table book, Privileged Access with Trudeau, Turner, and Chrétien, that was voted best political book by the Hill Times in 2000.
Travelling with prime ministers gave his career a boost and he had the opportunity to see the world. He was given unfettered access to world leaders, icons, sports stars and celebrities, capturing images of everyone from Mother Teresa and Nelson Mandela to Mick Jagger and Céline Dion.
His negatives and digital files are a virtual Rolodex of Ottawa’s history through five decades. He shares more than 300 photographs in the book, along with personal anecdotes about his favorites.
The book is more than just a political memoir. Like a real-life Forrest Gump, he has managed to pop up everywhere, including in the Queen Elizabeth Hotel where John Lennon and Yoko Ono were having their bed-in for peace. (He just missed capturing this event because they were in a recording session.)
He shares never-before-seen photographs of world leaders and celebrities goofing around. There are images of Chrétien and Bill Clinton acting like kids, hopping a two-metre balustrade on a dare from Prime Minister Chrétien, who proved to be in better shape. There is Queen Elizabeth II smiling and posing wistfully in an unguarded moment at Buckingham Palace. And of course, there are images of the photographer himself with master photographer Yousuf Karsh, mugging for the camera in front of a portrait of Sir Winston Churchill.
Perhaps his greatest challenge and delight involved chasing the always energetic Jean Chrétien around the world. The pair became close and Chrétien penned a foreword for the book. Forewords were also provided by former chief justice Beverley McLachlin and singer-songwriter Paul Anka.
“Thanks to his hockey regimen, Jean-Marc was able to keep up with me whether I ran up stairs, ran up the Great Wall of China, skied or jumped walls,” Chrétien writes. “One of his trademarks is his ability to find himself at the right place at the right time. A fly on the wall with a Leica! He seemed to be everywhere.” Check his website at carissephoto.com.
