This is Misha - A Story Of How Dog Photography Can Be So Impactful
I could tell you a hundred stories about what makes Misha remarkable because she is. Instead, I would like to tell you the story of my favourite moment featuring my dog photography from The Affordable Art Fair last month.
As you may have seen from the reel I posted on my Instagram page or my stories from the fair, I had some prints on a table outside The Dog Photo-booth. I took those with me to show a few examples of my outdoor sessions as I was photographing with a bespoke studio set up in the booth.
Towards the end of the last day, a family and their young daughter approached the table. Well, the adults were dragged by the daughter 😅 She was maybe 8 or 9. Without hesitation, she immediately walked over to the table of prints, her parents following.
I was standing nearby, waiting to see if they’d like to talk about anything as I’m not a salesy person at all, and wanted to give them space to have a look around without pushing anything on them.
“I’m pretty sure they’re not for sale, I’m sure of it…”
I listened a liiiiittle more closely as the dad said this to his daughter. She pulled his sleeve, and looked at him with… puppy-dog eyes.
“I really don’t think you can buy them, I’m sorry, I know you want it but I’m pretty sure they’re not for sale…”
The little girl looked upset and stood morosely staring at the prints on the table. The mom looked at the prints, the frames on the wall, and finally we made eye contact. That was my invitation. I stepped forward and said hello. Immediately the dad turned to me and said “you’re not selling these, are you?”
I said that no, the prints were not for sale and were just there as samples for people to look at. The little girls face fell even further, and her dad said to her “see, I told you.”
Her mom then said “we walked past your table when we first came into the fair and she saw these photos. she hasn’t stopped talking about them since. We’ve been here for a couple of hours now and she’s constantly begged us to buy her one of the photos because she loves it so much and wants to put it up in her bedroom.”
The little girl continued staring at the table, her eyes never left it once, not to look at her family, not to look at me. She just stared at the table. “We’ve told her so many times that we don’t think we can buy it, so she asked us if she could at least come and look at it one more time before we go home.”
I stepped a little closer to the table and gestured to the prints on the table.
“Which one do you like?” I asked her.
Without looking at me still, she pointed to this image. She was so polite and careful; she didn’t touch anything, simply pointed and said “this one.”
I picked the print up, and handed to her. “Here you go, you can have it.” She held it in two hands, gently, and continued to stare at it.
Her parents immediately both started telling me that I didn’t have to do that, that I didn’t need to give it to her. Her eyes never left the image.
“It’s okay, honestly,” I told them. “If she’s that drawn to the photograph, I want her to have it. It would mean a lot to me for her to have it. Her loving it this much is the reason I do what I do.”
They thanked me, and lowered their gazes to their daughter. “Are you happy?” They asked, “Yes” she whispered back. “Say thank you,” they told her. She looked at me for the first time, whispering thank you.
“She’s wanted a dog for ages,” the dad told me. “We said she has to wait until she’s 10.”
“Are you going to hang that on your wall now?” Her mom asked her. She nodded, holding my print like it was precious to her. They thanked me some more. Such lovely, genuine people.
Seeing her immediate connection with Misha through my photography, a dog who she has never met before, encapsulated everything I aim to do with my dog photography for dogs and their humans and it was absolutely wonderful.
“You’ll be 10 soon enough,” I told their daughter. I gestured at the print in her hands again, “and until then… This is Misha.”
ARE YOU READY TO IMMORTALISE YOUR DOG WITH A PHOTOGRAPHY EXPERIENCE?
Why not say hello, and let’s begin an incredible journey together…
