Ian Weldon is not a wedding photographer. But he does shoot weddings. He recently became the first photographer ever (probably) to have an exhibition of wedding photography in a ‘proper’ gallery, with a show at the Martin Parr Foundation in Bristol, England. He also produced a book to coincide with the show, publishhed by RRB PhotoBooks and entitiled, of course, “I Am Not a Wedding Photographer.”
Partly as a result of the show, Ian has subsequently had a lot of press coverage in major outlets including the BBC, The Guardian, i-D.Vice, Creative Review, Huck Magazine and It’s Nice That. He has 18.2K folllowers on Instagram. Which is a lot.
Ian also hosts and produces the second best UK-based photography podcast: Outerfocus, in which he talks to photographers about their work and whatever else comes up. (My appearance, for what it’s worth, is here.)
On episode 113, Ian discusses, among other things:
His solo show at the Martin Parr Foundation
Being taken into care as a young child
His time in the army…
…and going a bit nuts on drink and drugs after leaving
How photography saved his life
Getting into shooting weddings
How his ethos evolved
His podcast, Outerfocus
Being offered a very personal commission from Martin Parr
Referenced:
Martin Parr (Ep 91.)
Helen Levitt
Bruce Gilden (Ep 84.)
Richard Avedon
Don McCullin
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“Photographing granny on the dance floor with two pints of lager in her hand purposely is different to recognising something that you connect with and photograph. And that’s where there’ll always be a difference with what I do. I have no commercial interest at all with weddings... I’m not running a business with wedding photography... I just want people to get what I do and when people get that, then great, we’re on.”
