Hi everyone! I’m thrilled that my photographic submission was selected for the Moses Znaimer-curated exhibition The Last Taboo, which focuses on breaking down stigmas around aging. The exhibition will be held in Toronto from October 31-November 1, 2009. A limited, signed series of framed art photographs will be available for sale onsite.

My series of stylized, artistic documentary images is titled Women of a Sensual Age, and follows three women over 50 during a sitting for an oil portrait. They were asked to express how they feel sensual at this moment in their lives.

Hello again! I just couldn’t wait to share a few shots from my most recent wedding with Amelia & Sean in Holguin, Cuba in December 2007. Not only was this couple really easygoing and fun to be around, so were all their friends and family who came down for the week. I loved the fact they asked me to stay for the whole week with them, and it was a blast to not only photograph their wedding day, but also to capture their group just having fun playing frisbee football and volleyball on the beach. As well, Amelia and I had a secret photoshoot together one day on the beach to capture some sensual images of her “for the groom’s eyes only!” Their beautiful wedding was on a private beach at the upscale Paradisus de Oro Hotel, which was located right on the ocean. Here are a few images to give you a sense of the upbeat energy experienced all week…

I just love the richness of color photographs as much as I adore the timeless elegance of black & white images. But most importantly, I feel that getting to know Amelia & Sean before the wedding week was invaluable. Trust is so important to develop between a photographer and couple. Once that is established, I know that the bride, groom and by extension, the whole wedding party, feel that they can relax and be themselves… with the confidence that I will capture the emotions and magic of how their wedding day really happened. Two couples who were at Amelia & Sean’s wedding got engaged a week later, so I know you lovebirds were a great inspiration… BRAVO!

Hello world! My name is Bobbi Jo Hart, and I am a wedding photojournalist. What that basically means is that I love to photograph weddings in a documentary or cinema-verite style… to capture the REAL, unchoreographed moments of a wedding day, as they naturally happen.

So on this first blog, I thought I’d give you a bit of background on myself and how I found myself turning my lenses and life toward wedding photojournalism. You see, in my “past life”, I worked for many years as an award-winning documentary filmmaker — travelling to places like Zimbabwe, Russia, Australia and Pakistan. This exciting, wonderful work that allowed me to tell incredible stories and to capture the lives of intriguing people like tennis stars like Serena Williams and Anna Kournikova or nurses fighting discrimination in Pakistan.  

Then I had my beautiful daughter and wanted to stay home with her for the first couple years, so documentary world travels were out and freelance writing and photography was in!  Some photos ended up in a magazine distributed in the Bahamas. One day someone saw that magazine and emailed me to say she loved my shots of the island of Great Exuma, and wanted to know if I would photograph her beach wedding there. Little did I know that this innocent email was the beginning of a beautiful and passionate new career… not to mention a wonderful friendship with the bride, groom and their family!

 So I ended up flying to the island of Great Exuma, Bahamas and witnessed the most intimate and beautiful wedding day… that of Soraya and Danny… and as you can see by this photo, they have such great energy and I absolutely love their whole family! After the beach ceremony, where everyone was dressed in off-white linen (gorgeous!), the 25 people in the wedding party changed clothes and piled into a few motor boats for a five minute trip to neighboring Stocking Island for the private reception at a cool, beachfront haunt called the Chat n’ Chill. Imagine an incredible barbecue, beach volleyball and the freshest, most amazing conch salad you’ve ever tasted!

You can see more photos I took from Soraya & Danny’s wedding in Great Exuma, Bahamas at:

http://www.bobbijohart.com/Gallery.asp?GalleryID=8509&AKey=TVLNT9FL

After photographing their wedding and witnessing their incredible reactions to the photos – and realizing that I had way too much fun doing it – I started researching and discovered the Wedding Photojournalist Association (WPJA), who only accept 5% of applicants into their organization after scrutinizing the photographer’s website and photos to make sure their style is really “photojournalistic”. So I got a website up and applied for membership with the photos from Soraya and Danny’s wedding, crossed my fingers, and told myself that if I could get into the WPJA, then it was destiny for me to whole-heartedly pursue a career in wedding photojournalism.

Two months and alot of nail biting later, I received notice that I was accepted as a new WPJA member! The rest is history, and now here I am blogging away about my passion for people photography! I love shooting weddings, but ultimately I just LOVE any photography involving people living their real lives… be it a bar mitzvah, baptism, family reunion… all these events involve people sharing something beautiful. I just aspire to capture images for them that will resonate with heart for years, and generations, to come.

 Someone once said:

 ”Find something you would do for free, then make a living at it.”.

 Those words resonated with me when I realized how many years I had been taking photos for the pure passion of it… how when I witnessed a beautiful moment with friends, family or even strangers, how my instinct was to try and capture it on film. Even while making documentary films, I would find time to photograph people from that country, many of whom had never had photos taken of them before! And when I gave them copies of the images I took, the joyful smiles on their faces spoke volumes, and it meant so much for me to have given a special moment of their lives to them, something they could pass onto their children one day.  Even in high school I took photos alot, and ended up creating a senior slide show with images and music… that we still show at reunions! It took awhile, but looking back I realize that photographing people has been my passion all along!

 Ok, time to call it a night, but I look forward to your comments and appreciate you taking an interest!