GroundTruth Emerging Photographer Natalia Mindru, who studied photography at the National Institute of Cultural Research and Training in Bucharest, has for the past year been working on this project on couples in love. Elements of the project can also be seen at Cosmopolitan and the Daily Mail.
In a series titled Iubiri Urbane (translated from my native Romanian, it means Urban Love Stories), I capture the raw, unabashed love between couples in and around Bucharest. This is my ode to stolen kisses, kept secrets, and unspoken words shared between lovers in a city that rarely stands still enough to notice.
Bucharest, Romania. A moment of fun, fighting with pillows. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
A couple from Chisinau, Republic of Moldova. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
An engaged couple from Bucharest. He is stunt performer participating in different contests, and an active member of Strongman Champions League, Romania. She is also a former sport performer. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
A couple from Chisinau, Republic of Moldova, playing with a cat. The woman has a vintage camera and tries to capture the cat’s attention. She is a blogger and he is a wedding photographer. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
A couple from Bucharest They’ve been together for two years. Both are students. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
A couple from Chisinau, Republic of Moldova. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
This young woman is engaged to be married. She was caught in a moment of reverie. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
A couple from Chisinau, Republic of Moldova, embraces in candlelight. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
She is an engineering student in Bucharest. He is from Israel and studying medicine in Bucharest. (Natalie Mindru/GroundTruth)
The first couple I photographed for Urban Love Stories. They are from Bucharest, Romania. A tender moment, of kisses and a whisper. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
The face-to-face portrait is very simple. At the same time I wanted to show that they are so close, they share their breath, their warmth, their everything. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
A Bucharest couple captured in a cozy embrace. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
She is from Moldova and a student in Bucharest. He is Romanian.and working in sales. They had a romantic moment, while their cat watched. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
This couple is from Chisinau, Republic of Moldova. She is a singer, and has graduated from music school in Paris. He is volleyball player on a local team. They had a moment of fun and hilarity. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
Both partners are photographers from Moldova. In this image, they imagined they had talking legs. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
These lovers are Romanian students. I was trying to take romantic picture, but cat kept intruding into the frame. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
Young lovers in Bucharest. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
Young lovers frolic in Chisinau, Republic of Moldova. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
She was reminded of something and started to cry. He held her face, whispering how much he loved her. (Natalia Mindru/GroundTruth)
Before arriving at a couple’s home to photograph them, I know nearly nothing about my subjects. The only prior communication I have had with them is through social media and, as a result, I approach each session without preconceived notions or expectations. In this way, Iubiri Urbane offers a fresh exploration of love in its many forms: tender, sometimes playful and other times messy, but the series always depicts the natural attraction between two people.
By choosing to photograph in a photojournalistic style, I let couples to do whatever they want to do and look at their usual behavior. I don’t need them to “pretend” love. They are real couples, not actors. Iubiri Urbane takes all my energy and is a great source of inspiration for me – I love getting messages from people in different countries who enjoy this genre of photography, they are my encouragement to continue.
In this project, I photographed with myCanon Mark II and Mark III.
