THE PHOTO: Everyone’s talking about the White House’s situation room picture. After taking a few days to contemplate things, here’s my take.

Over at the BAG, Michael Shaw and a long thread of commenters examine Obama’s body language and the gendered nature of power. At the NYT, David Brooks and Gail Collins discuss emotion and gender. Says Collins, “It would be nice if the definitive photo didn’t show the only woman in the room looking stricken.” And, in a move near and dear to my heart, CNN doesn’t read the photo, it reads the comments about the photo posted to Flickr.

I notice that many commentators are emphasizing how “diminuitive” or off to the side Obama appears in this photo. I disagree. He is in fact the singular subject of this photo, despite Hillary Clinton’s emotive gesture. True, the president is not sitting in the big leather chair, which one assumes is his typical seat. But it’s wrong to suggest he’s less visually important simply because he’s not in the “power chair” or because he’s not towering over everybody else. Compositionally, he is the most prominent thing in this photo. Here’s why:

(a) Space and bodies. Obama is not one of the crowd here. He’s physically separated from nearly all of the other bodies in the room, even Webb’s right next to him. This gives him prominence.

(b) Light. Yes, Obama’s sitting in the corner, but the light coming from above shines down upon him in that corner, further inviting our attention to his body and his focused gaze.

(3) Obama is the photo’s vertical “nerve center.” Above, I divided the image into three roughly equal vertical parts (red dots). Notice that when we do this, Obama lines up perfectly with the walls that come together to form the corner. Obama thus lives right along the line that separates the left and center third of the picture; he can’t be shunted off to either side. What else rides along that line? The technology enabling communication of the operation as it unfolds. Note that tangle of yellow and green wires and the laptop right below Obama’s face: nerve center.

As for the gender trouble in Hillary’s seemingly emotional state? She spins a more prosaic explanation: allergies.