Iconic rock 'n' roll photos at EMP get superstar treatment

Graham Nash is an unfailingly polite rock 'n' roll superstar — "polite" not often associated with the "rock superstar" part — and Friday he was at Experience Music Project going through the seemingly endless loop of interviews needed to promote a pet project.

In this case, it was a rather astounding exhibit of some 98 of the most famous rock 'n' roll photos ever taken.

That group includes a naked John Lennon in bed, hugging Yoko, a photo taken by Annie Leibovitz on Dec. 8, 1980, just hours before Lennon was shot and killed outside the entrance to the Dakota apartment building in New York.

It includes Janis Joplin slumped on a backstage couch, clutching a bottle of Southern Comfort. It includes Johnny Cash giving a defiant finger gesture while getting ready to sing for prisoners at San Quentin in 1969, and asked by photographer Jim Marshall: "Hey, John, you got a word for the warden?"

Nash, who loves rock and photography, had been asked to be "guest curator" for "Taking Aim," which opens Saturday at EMP and runs through May 23.

But Nash did considerably more than just be a guest, says Jasen Emmons, EMP's director of curatorial affairs.

He spent considerable hours culling through thousands of photos.

And when EMP had difficulty reaching particular photographers — works from 40 are represented in the exhibit — Nash contacted them personally.

"A quick call from Graham," is all it'd take, Emmons says, and reticent photographers responded right away. "They have great respect for him."

Nash is known to rock fans as a founding member of one of the 1960s British Invasion groups, The Hollies, and as co-founder of Crosby, Stills & Nash.

But he's also pursued a successful career in photography, with his pictures exhibited in museums and galleries around the world. He co-founded Nash Editions, the first professional fine-art digital printmaking studio.

At 68, although well-off, with homes in Kauai and Los Angeles, Nash is not much for retiring.

In the foreword to the book accompanying "Taking Aim," he writes about jumping at the chance to show through the exhibit's photos "what is so difficult to put into words: how the spirit of rock 'n' roll is mainly an attitude, an attitude of 'get out of my way. I have something to say here.' "

And so the exhibit shows a young Elvis reaching out to girls in the audience in 1956 when singing at a Mississippi state fair. And Pete Townshend of The Who making his trademark leap in the air at 1982 show. And a smirking Jerry Lee Lewis in London in 1958.

Promoting the exhibit, Nash tells the story that he makes sound fresh, although it isn't — who knows how many thousands of interviews he's done over the decades — about when he was 10, growing up in a modest home in Salford, England.

His dad was an amateur photographer, he says, and about once a month his dad would turn Graham's bedroom into a darkroom, covering the window with a blanket from the son's bed.

One particular day, after taking Nash and his sister to the local zoo, the dad set up the trays of photographic chemicals.

He called his son and told him to watch what was happening to a blank piece of paper.

As the developer worked, an image of an elephant appeared.

"It was pure magic," says Nash. He was hooked.

Nash talks about taking up photography seriously in 1969, when rock had made him famous and given him money. He had a darkroom built in his home in 1970. "I'd spend days, not hours, there."

He always takes along his camera, which these days is a Canon 5D Mark II that runs around $3,300. He was taking photos Friday morning in Seattle, he says, of the side of a taxi that looked interesting to him.

Nash himself has four photos in the EMP exhibit. His favorite is a close-up, silhouette he took of Johnny Cash, offstage, in Nashville in June of 1969. You cannot see any details, just the outlines.

But it is Cash, unmistakably.

" ... Johnny Cash standing there, just reflecting on his life, I'm sure. But this really, to me, is the man in black," writes Nash in the caption.

Friday was a full day for Nash, with interviews, autograph signings for anyone who asked, posing for photographs, a reception.

Emmons has worked with other rock stars.

"It can be a struggle," he says. But Nash, he says, "He's one of the few true gentlemen of rock 'n' roll."

Nash is told how he surprises people by being so polite.

He says, "It's a (bleep) part of my job. My (bleep) job doesn't end until my head hits the pillow."

But he says it very politely, with a smile.

Erik Lacitis: 206-464-2237 or elacitis@seattletimes.com