Children of the Wedding at Cincinnati Art Museum

Children, children. Please take the party outside. 

And indeed they did. I get the sense that playgrounds were a clever way to preoccupy and restrain our children before TVs were invented. In the absence of either where the bounds of the play area are otherwise clearly defined or implied, the children assume everything is fair game. 

There once was a cat who marked our yard as its territory by rubbing on everything and scratching our trees. Children don't rub on things or scratch things (most of the time), but these ones certainly made an effort to climb every ledge, walk/run/sit on every surface, hang on railings, and puzzle at some of the art on display outside the Cincinnati Art Museum. 

As a casual observer who made the occasional safety-related remark (“keep off the road!”), I felt like I had been transported to Neverland. It was magical. Mystical. Beautiful. Youthful. And I was a special guest in their world. I sometimes felt invisible and at times like they were putting on a show for the camera. They moved so fast and there were so many precious moments that I felt I couldn't keep up. I would miss some of the shots. But by Jove, I would try my darndest. Was this what wedding photographers felt like? I could only imagine. 

Like many of our photographic journeys, this one started out simple and ended in dreamy unexpected moments I captured. A college friend was getting married. Like many in nerdom, he had earned his PhD. My spouse and I kept in touch with him over the years and were very excited for him to find love. I've never seen someone so in love. When I had dinner with him and his wife a month or so after the wedding, it was like the world melted away and they would dreamily stare at each other. I thought that kind of love was only in fiction until I saw it. 

So, when we got an invite to our friend’s wedding and I was getting the hang of a DSLR, I asked if I could pretty please with a cherry on top take pictures at his wedding. I would share any I took with him, I wouldn't use flash, wouldn't get in the way of the real professionals, and most of my pictures would be of my daughter anyways. I'm still in the honeymoon phase of my parenting (does it ever end?) - I only have eyes for my little girl. I did end up keeping 4 pictures of him and his bride but the rest were of the kids. 

Like most gatherings, my daughter got bored after scribbling an art masterpiece in the guest book and went off to explore. She followed some other kids outside the building and that's when the afternoon sunset transformed the entrance of the Cincinnati Art Museum into a children's magical land of backlit hair, bokeh effects, camera lens flares, and many shades of lighting. The boy, in particular, kept posing intentionally. So I amused him and took pictures. Kids love to see pictures of themselves and he was no different. In order to avoid favoritism, I took pictures of his sister too. Their mom and I later spoke and agreed I could keep the photos and take more. So, I shot pictures to my heart's content. The mom, of course, got a copy of all my edited photos. 

This wedding was a first for me. Not attending weddings, but taking and editing photos that I deliver to someone else. I puzzled over which pictures the mom would like. Not knowing her preference, I edited most of the ones I took. I further thought about how I could make her children look and feel beautiful in the images. She had said she didn't have any recent pictures of them in fancy clothes. And I wanted to give her just that. I'm sure her children are as beautiful in her eyes as my daughter is in mine. I just hope I got close to capturing that in my images.

After our friend's wedding in Ohio, I was kind of hooked. Could I do this professionally? Would others like my photos? Would the captured images tell the story I imagine? I wasn't sure about it all, but I knew I wanted more.