Excerpt: While one photograph can reveal the intimacy of a traditional ritual, another spells out the space that needs to be bridged by the bride and the groom to enjoy nuptial bliss.
A random event that changes everything for a lifetime. Sounds like marriage, isn’t it? Now does that put you on tenterhooks? But then don’t forget the famous ‘dilli ki laddu’ saying because like the mythical sweet, you equally regret it if you don’t relish it.
In a wedding, the most important characters are, of course, the bride and the groom. Yet that can hardly be a fair comment. What about the magic and the merriment that manifest on this big day in moments, which when captured make memories? In fact, every moment is a character in this ceremony of life and each one has a unique story to tell.
Perhaps it all begins with the coming together of the palms. The first contact between the bashful bride and the equally hesitant groom. A significant symbolic act in a Hindu marriage. But then it’s the eyes of the partners that dominate the conversation, which relentlessly goes on between them. In spurts and in continuum. They smile as much as they smear the two individuals with love and longing, and perhaps only a picture (a photograph) can capture “a thousand words” that are communicated through them. And it is in these eyes that the dreams of the years of togetherness start being woven, waiting to witness the touch of reality and bear the fruits of fruition.
A Hindu marriage is a classic rendition of proximity and separation. The fleeting moments of closeness thoughtfully interspaced with stretches of distance. There are customs which call for the groom embracing the bride and performing certain rituals while there are many which engender estrangement. It is the interplay of these contradictions that are worthy of being clicked to capture the essence of the occasion. Only to relive them again and again, and here I’m reminded of the American journalist, Mignon McLaughlin, who said, “A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person.”
While one photograph can reveal the intimacy of a traditional ritual, another spells out the space that needs to be bridged by the bride and the groom to enjoy nuptial bliss. The background, a parameter which is carefully chosen by the photographer, further adds to making the moment memorable. The string of lights, the chandelier, the contrasting colours, the visual camaraderie that ranges between a blur and a focus, all fit in as little parts to create an interesting whole, which is subtle yet substantial.
Audrey Hepburn once said that “If I get married, I want to be very married.” By “very married” she could have meant the completeness of the experience, not only the serious but also the flippant. So while a wedding is a weighty affair, it has its lighter moments as well. Obviously the laughs are more cherished than the intense events. A friend of mine, for instance, when going through her wedding album can vividly recall the humour that her husband had hushed into her ears just before he smeared her forehead with vermilion. She cannot, however, vouch such candidness for each of the customary rituals.
Truly, a marriage is an engagement of all our senses and what could be a better way to incessantly indulge in them than forging them into unforgettable memories!
Author : Promita Banerjee Nag