''Official Portraits'' is a book published by Berlin Press in 2004. In 2004, a team of Berlin Press contributors, led by David Brown sent an

open letter An open letter is a letter that is intended to be read by a wide audience, or a letter intended for an individual, but that is nonetheless widely distributed intentionally. Open letters usually take the form of a letter addressed to an indiv ...

fax Fax (short for facsimile), sometimes called telecopying or telefax (the latter short for telefacsimile), is the telephonic transmission of scanned printed material (both text and images), normally to a telephone number connected to a printer o ...

to the embassies of all 191 member states of the

United Nations General Assembly The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA or GA; french: link=no, Assemblée générale, AG) is one of the six principal organs of the United Nations (UN), serving as the main deliberative, policymaking, and representative organ of the UN. Curr ...

, requesting they provide an official portrait of their nation's

Head of State A head of state (or chief of state) is the public persona who officially embodies a state Foakes, pp. 110–11 " he head of statebeing an embodiment of the State itself or representatitve of its international persona." in its unity and l ...

. Most obliged, and ''Official Portraits'' is thus a gallery of the received entries. The portraits vary greatly in quality, photography style, and size, but Brown says there is no noticeable correlation between the quality of the portrait and any variable of the country that provided it. Some countries did not provide a suitable portrait (for example, merely emailing a low-resolution JPEG), these are included in a small index in the back of the book. In Brown's letter he specifically asks the embassies for pictures of their "effective head of state... who actually runs the country." In practice, a more formal term may be "

head of government The head of government is the highest or the second-highest official in the executive branch of a sovereign state, a federated state, or a self-governing colony, autonomous region, or other government who often presides over a cabinet, ...

" and indeed, most of the portraits are of heads of government (

Prime Minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister i ...

s) and thus not heads of state per se. Some countries did not understand the request, apparently, and emailed portraits of

figurehead In politics, a figurehead is a person who ''de jure'' (in name or by law) appears to hold an important and often supremely powerful title or office, yet ''de facto'' (in reality) exercises little to no actual power. This usually means that they ...

or otherwise symbolic officials who cannot be said to "run the country" in any meaningful sense. These include: *

St. Lucia Saint Lucia ( acf, Sent Lisi, french: Sainte-Lucie) is an island country of the West Indies in the eastern Caribbean. The island was previously called Iouanalao and later Hewanorra, names given by the native Arawaks and Caribs, two Amerin ...

- portrait submitted of

Governor General Governor-general (plural ''governors-general''), or governor general (plural ''governors general''), is the title of an office-holder. In the context of governors-general and former British colonies, governors-general are appointed as viceroy ...

Pearlette Louisy Dame Calliopa Pearlette Louisy (born 8 June 1946) is a Saint Lucian academic, who served as governor-general of Saint Lucia from 19 September 1997, until her resignation on 31 December 2017. She is the first woman to hold the vice-regal office ...

* Grenada - portrait submitted of

Daniel Charles Williams *

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders ...

- portrait submitted of President Kostis Stephanopoulos *

Monaco Monaco (; ), officially the Principality of Monaco (french: Principauté de Monaco; Ligurian: ; oc, Principat de Mónegue), is a sovereign city-state and microstate on the French Riviera a few kilometres west of the Italian region of Lig ...

- portrait submitted of

Prince Rainier III Rainier III (Rainier Louis Henri Maxence Bertrand Grimaldi; 31 May 1923 – 6 April 2005) was Prince of Monaco from 1949 to his death in 2005. Rainier ruled the Principality of Monaco for almost 56 years, making him one of the longest-ruling m ...

It may also be interesting to political scientists to note the photographs submitted by countries whose exact office of heads of state or government are unclear: *

North Korea North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu (Amnok) and T ...

Kim Jong Il Kim Jong-il (; ; ; born Yuri Irsenovich Kim;, 16 February 1941 – 17 December 2011) was a North Korean politician who was the second supreme leader of North Korea from 1994 to 2011. He led North Korea from the 1994 death of his father Kim ...

, described as "Chairman of the National Defense Commission" *

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

President President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) * President (education), a leader of a college or university * President (government title) President may also refer to: Automobiles * Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ...

Mohammad Khatami (''not'' Supreme Leader

Ayatollah Khamenei Sayyid Ali Hosseini Khamenei ( fa, سید علی حسینی خامنه‌ای, ; born 19 April 1939) is a Twelver Shia '' marja and the second and current Supreme Leader of Iran, in office since 1989. He was previously the third president ...

) *

Libya Libya (; ar, ليبيا, Lībiyā), officially the State of Libya ( ar, دولة ليبيا, Dawlat Lībiyā), is a country in the Maghreb region in North Africa. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to the east, Suda ...

- Muammar Gaddafi, described as "Leader of the Great Al Fatah Revolution"

References

External links

{{cite book, editor1-last=Zwangsleitner, editor1-first=Klaus, title=Official portraits : the executive heads of state of the 191 member states of the United Nations Organisation, date=2004, publisher=Trolley, location= ondonisbn=978-1904563334 Photographic collections and books