My paternal grandfather died when I was three.  My brother Mark was eight and he has a few memories; Sundays, a shop, square ice creams, they’re small fragments, but they belong to him and he can reach back and find something.

I know my grandfather was part of my early life, but I have no memories of being with him and I haven’t been able to find a meaningful photograph of us together.  There is some cine film footage of us all but that’s it.

I would love to have one to be able to see the two of us in the same photograph and discover something about how we were with each other.  The memories I have been given are from my aunts and it is so lovely to hear but I had nothing to look at when they were telling the stories,

That is why, when someone wonders whether their child is too young for portraits with their grandparents, I see value in photographing the relationship as it is now.

The relationship has already begun

A baby doesn’t need to be old enough to remember a grandparent for that grandparent to matter.

There may already be a familiar voice, a comfortable place on a lap or a particular way they are held. The adults know the little routines, who gets the biggest grin, who can settle them, who happily has the same conversation over and over again. For me those things are worth noticing while they are happening.

We don’t have to wait until a child can explain the relationship to us from day one there is already something to photograph.

Sometimes photographs remember relationships for us until we’re old enough to remember them ourselves.

What I would want to see

If I found a photograph of myself with my grandfather, I wouldn’t be checking whether we were both looking at the camera.

I would be looking at him, then at me; how close we were, how he held me and whether there was something in our expressions that felt familiar.

A photograph couldn’t give me his voice or turn someone else’s memory into my own, but it could show me something I haven’t been able to see.

That shapes the way I photograph grandparents and grandchildren now. I’m interested in what happens between them, rather than making their relationship fit a prescribed pose.

A child looking up at their grandparent can tell us something. So can a shared laugh or the quiet familiarity of sitting together. I don’t need everyone to perform the same expression for those portraits to matter.

Your everyday photographs matter too

You may already have lovely photographs on your phone of your child with their grandparents and those really count.

A quick photograph at home can hold something wonderfully particular, it could be the chair they always sit in, the toy that lives at Grandma’s house or the ordinary surroundings of their time together.

Professional portraits offer another opportunity to give that relationship your attention. You can be present with each other while I look for the photographs, rather than someone having to step out of the moment to take them.

I firmly believe that both have a place in your family’s story.

An invitation, without an obligation

Some grandparents enjoy being photographed and there are others would much rather stay behind the camera.

I believe in inviting them, and giving them room to make their own choice. Your wish for a photograph doesn’t override their feelings about being in it.

We can talk about this during your Discovery Call. Tell me about the relationship, what you would love to remember and how everyone feels about taking part. That helps me understand the people I’ll be photographing.

There is no requirement for a particular kind of grandparent portrait; we are guided by your family.

A relationship worth seeing now

My own experience makes this subject personal, but every family will have its own reasons for wanting these portraits.

Perhaps your child sees their grandparents every week, my grandad came to see us every week without fail and apparently I’d run our waving my hands saying grandad, grandad.  When he was not longer with us and my aunts visited I would do the same and then keep asking where’s grandad. Frequency doesn’t matter but loving the way they are together is reason enough for a photograph that recognises it.

A child being too young to remember doesn’t make that relationship any less real today.

At Woodland Hill Photography in East Grinstead, family portraits begin with a conversation about your people. If you would love to include grandparents, tell me about them. That is where we begin.