THERE is an exhibition of wedding photography with a difference coming to Ludlow.

It will show the work of Ian Weldon.

Ian was born in the north of England but didn’t hang around for very long. With a previous job list including milkman, salesman, soldier and lorry driver, he was always on the move.

Photography came to him later in life, at the age of 30, and he started to photograph weddings to make money so he could pursue other photography projects.

Turns out, weddings actually became his project.

Disgruntled with the industry’s arbitrary rules and traditions, Ian saw a need for a more documentary approach to weddings.

He began to make a body of work surrounding an industry and culture that he saw as antiquated, photographing the reality in his own irreverent and humorous way.

This is how he sees weddings. Ian is not

a wedding photographer.

Ian describes his approach as a photographic democracy where one photograph is no more important than any other – where all things are equal and people the same as objects.

Rather than arranging family shots, climbing on a step ladder and following a list of desired shots, he will be found capturing what the couple and most others will have missed.

The uncensored domestic backdrop of the preparations with the cans of beer and last minute ironing, expensive flowers transported in cardboard boxes, the inclement English weather, smokers out the back, split trousers, the desperate grasp for the canape, the waiting, forced smiles and the dad dancing.

Ian’s work came to the attention of Martin Parr after he gave a lecture on his work in Barcelona and the attendees of the lecture happened to be wedding photographers. They met and the rest is history.

It is a new take on wedding photography that has caught the public imagination.

The exhibition runs from Saturday, August 24, until the middle of October.