McCartney Candids

de bene esse: literally, of well-being, morally acceptable but subject to future validation or exception

The candid camera of 'Lovely Linda' McCartney which captured the Beatles, Mick Jagger and Steve McQueen on film

Paul McCartney says that his wife Linda (pictured together centre), who died tragically of breast cancer at 56, was the most important photographer covering the sixties' rock and roll music scene. 'I can think of no one else whose work was so comprehensive and who captured the essence better than Linda,' writes Paul in a new edition of a portfolio of her work. Linda's passion for music inspired her to work independently and she amassed a major portfolio of photographs of rock musicians from the 1960s to the 1990s. Her collection includes candid shots of The Rolling Stones (top left) which marked the start of her commercial photography career. The couple bought a modest farmhouse together on the Kintyre Peninsula in Scotland in 1982 (bottom left) after the breakup of the Beatles and she took several photos of her husband (top right, during a holiday in Jamaica in 1971) during their marriage. Bottom right is her shot of Steve McQueen and Ali McGraw in Jamaica in 1973.