Children rarely arrive as one thing.
They can be serious and silly within seconds.
Confident, then suddenly shy.
Wild with a brother or sister and completely still when they are alone.
I am not looking for the perfect smile.
I am looking for the child in front of me.
The expressions you know.
The ones you have never seen.
And sometimes the one that lasts for half a second before it disappears.
Childhood does not sit still.
I have photographed children in my Johannesburg studio since 2005.
The way I work is deliberately simple.
Careful light. Very little around them. Nothing competing for attention.
There are no themed sets or elaborate props.
A child does not need much added to make an interesting photograph.
Sometimes they need direction.
Sometimes they need space.
Sometimes the best thing I can do is wait.
The child is enough.
Not every child smiles on command.
I don't need them to.
A quiet child can be quiet.
A suspicious child can take their time.
A child who wants to laugh can laugh.
And the one who wants to pull a ridiculous face will probably get away with that too.
The aim is not to make every child look cheerful.
It is to make photographs in which you recognise them.
Expression matters more than performance.
Children change when another child enters the frame.
A brother can produce the laugh I could never ask for.
A sister knows exactly how to annoy her.
They lean, wrestle, whisper, compete, protect and collapse into one another.
I photograph children individually, but I also make portraits of siblings together.
Because sometimes who they are with each other is part of who they are.
The relationship belongs in the photograph too.
Childhood feels long while you are inside it.
It isn't.
Faces lengthen.
Teeth disappear and return.
Hair changes.
Bodies grow.
The child who once fitted easily on your lap becomes the teenager standing beside you.
A portrait cannot stop any of that.
It can only keep one small piece of it.
This is what they looked like then.
JOHANNESBURG PORTRAIT PHOTOGRAPHER
One Moment. One Portrait. Forever
© 2005–2026 Bridget Corke Photography
Blairgowrie · Johannesburg · South Africa
International Master's in Portrait Photography
One of only two in Africa.