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Wedding snapshots raised to the level of Art
Digitalisation, technological advances and access for the everyday user are opening up a new era in professional photography as contemporary 21st-century art. This is also true for wedding photographers, who are participating in all this innovation.
The current trend is for groundbreaking ideas, a radical aesthetic and high doses of creativity that lead to capturing exclusive images. The end is nigh for the classic snaps of the bride and groom posing in a park while holding hands, or caught next to friends and relatives. Wedding photography is going further and has demonstrated that it is an art in itself, drawing on other trends such as photo-reportage, advertising photography, landscape or documentaries. Whichever the line chosen by the author, spontaneity, freshness and originality predominates.
Nor is wedding photography free of artifice. Painstaking lighting, special effects and meticulous photographic retouching give rise to some of the best photos of the moment.
In this new scenario, the session may well take place over several days (pre-wedding, wedding and post-wedding) or may search for unforgettable settings far removed from the venue of the event. The latest innovation: ‘trash the dress’ photographs with the bride and groom imperilling their elegant garments, bathing in the sea, practising a high-risk sport or tearing their glamorous clothes.
The most cutting-edge photographers
Within the wide-ranging sector of wedding photographers, only a few have the gift of capturing the intimacy of a look, the transience of a magic moment or the simplicity of a feeling through an innovative viewpoint that will remain in the memory not only of the couple but in that of many others. Their focusing, technique and of course their photographs make of them the best photographers in the world.
Among their clients are actors, sportspeople, celebrities and members of high society. Their fees are not for every pocket; they can range from 4,000 euros per session to 20,000 for a complete album. They travel the world capturing unique moments and raising wedding photography to the highest artistic status.
Marcus Bell, the Australian Yervant Zanazanian, Nate and Jaclyn Kaiser or Rocco Ancora – listed by American Photo magazine as the principal exponents of wedding photography – are some of the most prestigious photographers of the moment. They are joined by Roberto Valenzuela, famous for portraying the jet set weddings of Beverly Hills, or the Briton David Pullum. But there are two Spaniards, father and son, who are at the head of this ranking: José Luis Guardia Peinado and José Luis Guardia Vázquez.
The talent of the Guardias
Having won more than 300 international prizes in the past two years, José Luis Guardia Peinado and José Luis Guardia Vázquez are viewed as the best wedding (and architecture) photographers worldwide. They are without a doubt a global benchmark for the quality of their work. In March they won the prize to Best Photographer of the Year at the Wedding and Portrait Photographers International (WPPI) convention, the ‘Oscars’ of their industry.
Also outstanding in Spain is Carlos Felipe, gold and silver prize winner at the European Professional Photographer of the Year Awards 2011 in the Weddings section, and Enrique Oliver, winner this year of the Weddings Grand Award of the WPPI.
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Published in Fashion and Beauty by Patricia Rivera on 20/10/2011
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