in her mother’s gown

 
I have a few moms requesting yearly portraits of their daughters wearing the mom’s wedding gown, as a way of illustrating their growth from young girl-child to womanhood I suppose. Evidently this idea was featured on Oprah some time ago, and you know anything shown on Oprah is bound to attract a following.

As a photographer who prefers simplicity of clothing for portraits, these sessions always pose a challenge for me. How do I oblige the requests of the client and still feel true to my own vision? Where is the place that two very different ideas can meet and neither one feel compromised? Is it even possible?

When I was a young girl I was so acutely sensitive to conflict that I would do anything to avoid it. Usually this meant me quietly backing down from my own ideas, subjugating my desires in an effort to keep the peace. I wished for a harmonious world free of any sort of discord so that no one would feel discomfort ever.

While I still wish for a harmonious world, I understand now that we each arrive with our own preferences and that is a good thing. It is the contrast that we see and experience that helps us discover and appreciate our own unique desires and decide what is pleasing to us. We’ve been given a veritable smorgasbord of amazing things and ideas to choose from and wouldn‘t it be boring if everyone chose the same thing? I think that the only reason conflict arises is that we so often try to dictate to others what they should choose for themselves……..what they should believe and follow.

I wasn’t at all certain how I was going to pull off the shoot featured above. The mom wanted her entire wedding gown included in the portrait, along with high-heeled shoes and tiara. I’m pretty sure that there was enough tulle within the gown to provide every bride married in 2006 with a veil……..it was a massive amount of fabric!

As I looked through the viewfinder it took great effort to even locate the 5 year old child within the scene, who was in fact squirming and quite uncomfortable from all that darned itchy tulle. Mom, grandmother, and the child’s nanny were busy fussing with the fabric, shoes, jewelry, tiara, and hair that wouldn’t stay in place. What came to my mind at that moment was a page from “where’s waldo”. Can you find the child? At one point she threw herself backwards in disgust at the whole fiasco and all I could see was a blizzard of white tulle, which was pretty comical in retrospect although while in the midst of it I could only shake my head and think, “this is so not working”.

We tried many different ideas, but at the end of the session I photographed the child more as I wished to see her. We compromised. I kept the tiara, but left her hair loose and more natural. The gown was implied but not quite so overpowering, and the portrait more about the child and less about the novelty of wearing her mother’s wedding gown.

I was relieved and happy that ultimately the mom chose this portrait of her beautiful young daughter to be among her favorites.

 
~Cynthia