Tag: cape town pregnancy photo

Pregnancy Portrait: This is Ursula

Post author By Leah
Post date September 18, 2015
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I met Ursula a number of years ago and was thrilled to be commissioned to shoot a series of pregnancy portraits of her as well as capture some family moments afterwards with herself, her daughter and her husband.

Ursula was pregnant with her second child, and in her third trimester when we worked together. The pregnancy portraits we shot were very simple but bold. I lit her with one light, set back, to just highlight her silhouette plus a little bit more detail created by a poly board on her other side.

There is a decadence in the profile of a pregnant women which I love. The shapes are so beautifully abundant. Every line of the female body becomes enhanced so that a series of interconnected spheres take over the body.

Heavily pregnant women, especially when shot in this style, remind me of the Venus of Willendorf, a paleolithic sculpture associated with fertility and childbearing (picture below).

Ursula and I also shot a few images with her young daughter in an embrace, the resulting image I find to be a special reflection of motherhood.
Together their bodies become a knot of warmth, love and nurturing.

Tags B&W nudes, B&W photography, cape town photographer, cape town photography, cape town pregnancy photo, cape town studio photography, leah hawker, Leah Hawker cape town photographer, nude photography, pregnancy, Pregnancy photoshoot, pregnant portrait

Women I've Shot

Pregnancy & Birth: This is Jacky

Post author By Leah
Post date February 2, 2015
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My beautiful sister Jacky fell pregnant with her first daughter in 2008. She was one of the first pregnant figures I worked with and I documented her a total of about seven times during her two pregnancies.

I shot a small series of images of her in our Grandmothers shawl (below and above pictures), as well as a series of silhouettes, images with her husband and with her daughters (during pregnancy & after birth). Here are a selection of the ones I find most special.

My Sister is the second oldest of the younger tier of our (female dominated) family on my Mothers side and was the first to have children, two daughters, confirming a recent comment about our family as “A Coven of Women” (which makes me smile).

I regret not documenting her first daughters “birth-day” but was terribly sick at the time and only got to photograph her a while later.

During Jacky’s second pregnancy I documented her in studio and on the beach with her little girl.

They stood on the beach for me, early one morning, when Jacky was about eight months pregnant.
Windswept on a beautiful Cape Town day these images are memorable for the sweet moments they shared talking about the soon-to-be new member of their family.

We shot a series of the two in studio, all soft natural light. I’ve realised how much I prefer a more “honest” and natural approach to documenting this kind of subject matter, thus I will almost always use available light and or outdoor spaces.

Her second babe arrived in June 2011 and I photographed their first moments together just hours after birth. Jacky stared at each perfect little piece of her while I captured these moments.

Tags cape town photography, cape town pregnancy photo, leah hawker, Leah Hawker cape town photographer, Leah Hawker photography, maternity photographer, newborn, newborn photography cape town, pregnancy, pregnancy and new born photography cape town, Pregnancy photoshoot

Women I've Shot

Pregnancy & birth: This is Lynette

Post author By Leah
Post date November 11, 2014
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Photographing a mother and tiny brand new baby is and always will be very special and memorable. Within the first day of their lives together one already sees magic happening: Motherhood.

I photographed these portraits of Lynette and baby Liam at the Cape Medi Clinic were he was born in September. Every tiny detail is in place and perfect and the parents are in a strange state of awe, shock, emotion, joy and pride (or it at least this is my interpretation of these moments!).

I had photographed a series of nude pregnancy images of Lynette just a short time before and was aiming to create a kind of parallel version depending on what scenario I found when I arrived, or, how possible it would be to shoot her and the new babe from above.

These are the beautiful and very foetal images I documented in studio while she was still pregnant…

I love the image which incorporated the environment around the bed (above). It emphasises the foetal quality of the image and also creates a relationship between subject and documentor.

The images are so soft and she looks like the epitomy of a pregnant women.

When I arrived in the hospital and walked into their room Lynette was standing square in the centre of the room and looked like a subject from a Rineke Dijkstra portrait (images of women immediately after they had given birth, standing up against a clinical hospital environment and holding their babies).

On the left is one of Rineke Dijksra's portraits of a new mother and on the left is exactly how I found lunette when I walked into her hospital room. It was like déjavu. — On the left is one of Rineke Dijksra’s portraits of a new mother and on the left is exactly how I found Lynette when I walked into her hospital room. It was like déjavu.

I photographed a series of portraits but this one I also really like for its imitation and parallel to the studio portraits I shot of her.

Tags birth photography, birth photography cape town, cape medi-clinic birth, cape town baby photography, cape town photography, cape town pregnancy photo, leah hawker, Leah Hawker cape town photographer, Leah Hawker photography, Lynette Bester, maternity, new born photographer, new born photography cape town, newborn, photography

Women I've Shot

Pregnancy: This is Lynette

Post author By Leah
Post date September 2, 2014
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I photographed dear friend and fellow artist Lynette with her fiancé Stephen early one morning on Camps Bay beach. She was eight months into a difficult pregnancy and these images seemed to come like a ray of sunshine before their tiny son Liam would arrive. We spent an hour or so in the sun and sand, it was a perfect morning, the beginning of Spring and felt to me like a positive premonition of what was soon to come.

We had discussed a playful and sweet, 50’s inspired feel and Lynette brought along some simple single coloured items which leant themselves to the look perfectly. The images come across like happy treasures, nostalgic and warm.

I love the simplicity of the approach we had on this shoot; the linear elements of the background contrasted with the round, organic shapes of her body. We left the beach feeling happy and inspired and headed to my studio in Woodstock for the second half of the shoot which was intended to be more of a nude portrait of Lynette on a bed of white linen, photographed from above. More on these images later.

Tags 1950s inspired, beach shoot, camps Bay Beach photo shoot, cape town photography, cape town pregnancy photo, colour blocking, leah hawker, Leah Hawker cape town photographer, Leah Hawker photography, Pregnancy photoshoot, pregnant portrait