Reinforcing conventions with photography

Looking at photos like these made me wonder: What is important in wedding photography – the subject, the form, the act of taking the picture?

While I didn’t cut a cake at my wedding let alone have it photographed, most of my friends and family (as well as many folks on the internet like those featured here) have a photo like this in their wedding albums: Man in suit, woman in white dress, both holding one decorative cake knife, both smiling as they make the first incision into their (usually) white, tiered cake.

To use my wedding as an example once again, I did not hire a wedding photographer. I figured some snapshots and my own memories would suffice. However, looking at the professional photographs of many other people’s weddings, I’m beginning to think that for many, the action of placing themselves in culturally predetermined poses and being photographed is as much a part of the marriage ritual as repeating the vows.

The bride and groom as individuals become less important in these photos than the poses they adopt. It reminds me of a passage in Don DeLillo’s White Noise. The narrator, Jack, describes going to the most photographed barn in America. Jack’s friend Murray tells him that no one actually sees the barn anymore, but they see what others see. They are “part of a collective perception.” As everyone takes pictures of the barn, they “reinforce the aura.”

Maybe as each couple poses for the cut-the-cake picture, they are reinforcing the traditions of marriage. By repeating the rituals and documenting them with photographs, perhaps they believe that they are creating a stronger union by becoming part of a larger tradition.