"At political events, there's an inevitable awkwardness," former Clinton administration official Sally Katzen said at a Women's Campaign Fund dinner at the Podestas' home this summer. "The art is an ice-breaker. It puts people at ease."

Not always. Folks attending a house tour in the Lake Barcroft neighborhood in Falls Church earlier this year got an eyeful when they walked into a bedroom at the Podesta residence hung with multiple color pictures by Katy Grannan, a photographer known for documentary-style pictures of naked teenagers in their parents' suburban homes.

"They were horrified," Heather recalls, a grin spreading across her face.

Married, With Art

Tony and Heather Podesta Are a Study in Power Collecting

By Jessica Dawson

Special to The Washington Post

Thursday, September 23, 2004; Page C01

The collection started almost by accident. It was 1980, and Tony Podesta was bidding adieu to co-workers from Sen. Ted Kennedy's just-failed bid for the presidential nomination. On their way out the door, staff members were handed whatever goodies remained – among them a tube of limited-edition prints donated to the campaign by the likes of Warhol and Rauschenberg.

A quarter-century later, those prints are history, but Podesta is counted among the nation's most important contemporary art collectors. Inside the elite Chelsea galleries, he and his wife, Heather, are gossiped about, deferred to and ushered toward the choicest works. All the art stars know their names.

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43480-2004Sep22.html