Ever since my kids were toddlers, I had this idea that I wanted to have a family portrait made, but I kept putting it off. One factor was fear; I do not llike pictures of me. Ever. Second, I didn't like the stiff, artificial, or colorized portraits I saw displayed at professional photo studios.
So when Do.Laura Heneis (die Kunstfotografin) suggested meeting for lunch to get to know one another before attempting a studio session, it was a huge relief. We did a portrait session first to get passport pictures and digital shots for the web out of the way first. Laura was patient, offered coaching and encouragement, and gave me the feeling that we had all the time in the world. She created a relaxed experience in what is in reality a very intimate, intense setting. We got some lovely portraits that day.
Our next session included my two teenagers and my dog. The fact that they participated at all speaks volumes about Laura's ability to put them at ease. My son even came back the next day with his skateboard because we had realized the day before that the session would be incomplete without the skateboard. I should add that I didn't like my hair that day; the gal at the salon had cut it much too short the week before. Both kids have teenage skin, my son wears braces on his teeth, and our dog is old and a bit grizzled. We were casually dressed in jeans.
In other words, we aren't supermodels, just ordinary flawed human beings. So the portraits came back showing ordinary people with the braces, the too short hair, the dings and dents of ordinary life. The compositions were beautifully structured, very pleasing to the eye visusally. But Laura had managed to capture something else, a quality I couldn't define until after I posted a selection of 10 photos to my Facebook page. Minutes after I posted the family album, Facebook exploded with messages and comments about how happy the kids look and how much they seem to like each other.
That's when I understood that what people were responding to was the subtext, not the surface, of the photos. The subtext was the affection and warmth between us, the playfulness and ease with which we interact, a sense of humor, even in the dog's expression. There is an arc to the photos too that conveys life and movement and joy. That's why friends were reacting they way they did to these photos of ordinary people. That's why I can return to the photos again and again and see something new each time. That's what Laura saw when she met us and what she managed to capture on film. read more
