The photographer and his crew sit outside the tank, grinning.
“Beauty, how long can you hold your breath under water?” one calls out to the sopping wet woman in the wedding gown. A moment later, he addresses the groom-to-be: “Handsome, when you dive down, just suck your tummy in a bit. Your bum as well.”
It’s not the most romantic scenario but the end results – post-Photoshop – are stunning. As is a custom in modern-day China, events manager Jenny Cheng and banker David Shaw have shelled out for pre-wedding photos, which can be as ambitious as they are expensive – up to $AU250,000 if shot in exotic destinations such as Paris, Bali or Sydney.
Jenny can’t swim, so she’s been anxiously practising holding hands underwater with David in swimming pools. David, an Australian, finds the whole procedure “fake” but is far more amenable than some of the mates who attend his eventual wedding six months later.
That’s according to Olivia Martin-McGuire, an Australian photographer who became intrigued by China’s billion-dollar pre-wedding photography industry while living in Shanghai for four years. Her film debut, China Love, is an empathetic take on how the country’s tumultuous history since the Cultural Revolution has influenced its present day.
“The pre-wedding industry is a moment in time … it’s this real fantasy moment where you are capturing a country dreaming,” she says. The backdrop to many photos may mimic a western setting, for instance, but 90% of Chinese people don’t have passports. “I don’t think it’s going to be like this in 15 years.”
In the film, couples who had state-arranged marriages during the country’s Communist party rule show the black-and-white wedding photos they had taken: more like ID cards, with the subjects still in their work uniforms. Wedding gifts back then tended to be literature by Chairman Mao.
“They didn’t have any access to the rest of the world, and then to have the next generation in this futuristic state of possibilities, where China is booming and becoming a world power – you have such a tension between those two generations,” Martin-McGuire says. “In other countries you have the past, the present and the future. But in China, you really just have the future and the past rubbing up against each other.”
Martin-McGuire follows some couples in their 80s and 90s, who are treated by a charity to belated pre-wedding photos as part of a project called Frame the Vow. These new photoshoots, which revolve around pampering and celebrating 60-odd years of love, are a way to heal from the trauma of growing up in Communist China.
For more read the full of article at The Guardian
