Int'l Kissing Day: A glance at iconic lip-locking moments

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International Kissing Day, which grew out of the UK's National Kissing Day, was established on July 6 in 2006 to promote kissing as an enjoyable experience.

So feel free to pucker up to someone significant whether a lover, friend or relative.

In some countries, creative kissing contests are held in which couples can win prizes by setting kissing records, and most importantly, sharing romantic stories.

In everyday life, a kiss may indicate a greeting, respect, affection, passion, or devotion as a ritual and social gesture.

July 6, 2012: A woman takes a picture of couples kissing as part of a flash mob in the town of Tyumen, Russia, on International Kissing Day. /VCG Photo

Through the touching of lips, sentiments and messages, simple or profound, can be conveyed without reservation, regardless of age, gender, religion, nationality, etc.

As an ambassador of love, kisses actually embrace greater power than many have realized.

Kissing has been an indispensable image in artworks and cinema and further attained iconic status thanks to those impressive, kissable moments in real life captured by the news photographs.

The kiss as an epitome of peace

“The Kiss", Alfred Eisenstaedt 1945 /Xinhuanet photo

One of the most iconic kisses is captured in a black-and-white photograph, named the “The Kiss” by Alfred Eisenstaedt in 1945. It shows a sailor grabbing and kissing a stranger – a woman in a white dress – in Times Square in celebration of the end of World War II.

The photo was published in Life magazine a few weeks later. But the identities of the two people remained a mystery for decades. It was not until 1980 that the couple in the photo was revealed to be George Mendonsa and Greta Zimmer Friedman.

Aug. 14, 2015: Actors reenact the famous picture of a sailor kissing a nurse on the 70th anniversary of Victory over Japan Day, near a replica sculpture in New York's Times Square. /VCG Photo

“It wasn't that much of a kiss. It was more of a jubilant act,” Friedman said in a 2005 interview. The reason he grabbed somebody dressed like a nurse, that he felt so very grateful to the nurses who took care of the wounded.”

“The Kiss” has exceeded itself to become an epitome of peace. Till today people still reenact the classic photograph in Times Square on Aug. 14, to commemorate the Victory over Japan Day and send wishes for world peace.

Kiss with shock value

May 13, 2016: People walk past a mural on a restaurant wall depicting US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin greeting each other with a kiss in the Lithuanian capital Vilnius. /VCG Photo

A kiss sometimes brings incredible shock value, from royal wedding kisses to tightly-embracing political figures depicted in the murals around the world.

Lithuanian street artist Mindaugas Bonanu might never expect that his creation would go viral instantly and even become a political satire with worldwide fame when he drew the imaginary mural, depicting a kiss shared by US president Donald Trump and Russian president Vladimir Putin, on the back wall of a BBQ restaurant in the Baltic capital Vilnius.

Jan. 21, 2017: A marcher carries a picture depicting Russian president Vladimir Putin (L) and US president Donald Trump kissing during the Women's March in Los Angeles. /VCG Photo

This image then was widely employed by people with opposing opinions on President Trump and had made appearances during anti-Trump demonstrations.

The mural depicting an imaginary kiss shared by Trump and Putin reminds us of another famous mural on a fragment of the Berlin Wall by the Russian artist Dmitri Vrubel that was painted in 1990 – the East German leader Erich Honecker locking lips with the Soviet premier Leonid Brezhnev.

Nov. 3, 2009: Tourists mimic a kiss in front of a likeness of the kiss between then Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev (L) and East German leader Erich Honecker on the East Side Gallery in Berlin. /VCG Photo

This mural piece has been given historic value and seen by millions but fewer have known that it is adapted on the basis of an actual photograph of Brezhnev and Honecker embracing in 1979.

Kiss in the chaos

The picture below is of another impressive kissing photograph that went viral among hundreds and thousands thanks to the sharp contrast it presents – the lovers kissing passionately on the ground ignoring the rioting crowd and armed policemen.

Australian Scott Jones was embracing his Canadian girlfriend Alexandra Thomas, giving her a kiss to calm her down after seeing her knocked to the ground by riot police, the couple said on CBS News two days after the riot.

June 15, 2011: Riot police walk in the street as a couple kiss in Vancouver, Canada where riots broke out after the city's hockey team the Vancouver Canucks lost in Game Seven of the Stanley Cup Finals. /VCG Photo

Their kiss was shot by Rich Lam in Vancouver, 2011, when ice hockey fans rioted on the streets after the Vancouver Canucks' 4-0 loss to the Boston Bruins in the Stanley Cup Final. It won the 2011 National Newspaper Award for news photography.

Instead of a shot well prepared and designed, the kiss-in-the-chaos photo is more like a God-given coincidence recorded by Lam’s camera.

The photographer revealed that he had no idea that the two people were kissing but thought one of them was hurt until his editor pointed it out while he filed the photos.

Kiss as the last goodbye

Sept. 14, 2017: Hamida, a Rohingya refugee woman, weeps as she holds her 40-day-old son after he died as their boat capsized before arriving on shore in Shah Porir Dwip, Teknaf, Bangladesh. /VCG Photo

Surrounded by wailing family members, a woman tightly held her 40-day-old son who had stopped breathing. It was a miserable moment captured by Mohammad Ponir Hossain on Sept. 14, 2017.

Hossain’s photo won the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for feature photography with other Reuters photographers documenting the Rohingya refugee crisis in Myanmar and Bangladesh.

Sept. 14, 2017: Hanida Begum (R) holds her infant son, Abdul Masood, who died when their boat capsized minutes before reaching shore. A relative holds his twin brother, who survived. /AP Photo

Hamida, the crying woman, was a Rohingya refugee fleeing with her family from home in Myanmar. She lost one of her twin sons as their boat capsized minutes before arriving on shore in Shah Porir Dwip, Bangladesh. To realize one infant son is still alive while another is not breathing is devastating.

This heartbreaking cheek-to-cheek kiss is the last goodbye of a grieving mom, an example of the huge human cost of conflicts.

(Zhang Mengxing also contributed to the report.)

(Cover photo: Couples kiss as part of a flash mob in the town of Tyumen on the International Kissing Day on July 6, 2012. /VCG Photo)