A behind the scenes look at Tony Blair

There sounds like an interesting exhibition has just opened at the National Portrait Gallery called Blair At War, a series of photographs taken by the filmmaker and travel writer Nick Danziger.

In March 2003 just before the Iraq war started, Danziger and a journalist called Peter Stothard were given close access to Tony Blair for 30 days and followed him in Britain, Europe and the US in the run up to the Iraq campaign. All the pictures are in black and white and show Blair meeting with the likes of President Bush and Jacques Chirac as well as his own staff as war is about to kickoff, Peter Stothard provides a written explanation of the scenes.

I’d be interested to see the ones of Alastair Campbell, Blair’s Director of Communications and the man with the most power under Blair until he resigned in late 2003. Campbell was responsible for the dossier presented to parliament on Saddam’s WMD’s and the claim he could launch weapons at Britain in 45 minutes. I think he resigned early realising what a balls up they’d made.

The exhibition is on until 15th July and is free. The National Portrait Gallery is open daily from 10am-6pm (9pm Thurs-Fri).