‘To say of a picture, as is often said in its praise,
that it shows great and earnest labour, is to say
that it is incomplete and unfit for view.’
James McNeill Whistler
Couples
Perhaps Whistler was a little harsh, but he had a point. For all the shooing and goading of guests that precedes virtually every stage-managed photograph at a wedding, it’s the unplanned, spur-of-the-moment ‘happening’ that tends to steal hearts.
It’s all about feeling comfortable. As always, time is the key. No photographer can imbue a chaotic scene with tranquillity and serenity, but there is one photographer able to impose order on a wedding day so that those quiet moments have time to happen, to emerge naturally and organically, rather than having to be ‘created’ in a blur of ‘just duck your head down’ or ‘can you get a tad closer?’ instructions. It’s John Brandwood.
The very best photographs are not composed by instructions; rather they are composed in an instant, to be savoured for a lifetime. An ancient Chinese saying has it that, ‘a picture is worth a thousand words’. Maybe so; but John’s shots of bride and groom, aglow with excitement, united in joy, personify just those ‘three little words’ that marriage consummates.