Evening star., 1923-04-05
The North Window
BY LEILA MECHLIN.


There was no such thing as photog-
raphy of any sort hundred years
ago. Our grandparents, or great
grandparents if we are still in our
teens. desiring portraits of them
selves to hand down to posterity had
to have them painted or drawn. In
many an attic or old secretary today
in quaint leather cases are daguerreo-
types made before 1855, which wit
ness to the first dawnings of this
new art. How quaint and interest
ing they look, and what excellent
little portraits some of them were!
But each was an original plate or
impression. Like color photography
today. they could not be reprinted or
reproduced in quantity.
Then came photography and as
result the whole process OF illustra-
tion has been revolutioned. the whole
attitude toward pictures changed In
the public mind the slogan, ou
push the button-we do the rest"
has found firm resting place; so that
the majority Of persons today have
little conception Of the use of the
camera as a medium for artistic ex-
preston and regard photographs
more or less as the result OF acci-
dent.
1t was because photography was SO
regarded that for a good many years
It was not given place In the art
museums. the directors of these
homes OF art regarding it as a com
mercial product. an industry. The
Washington Camera Club, made up OF
enthusiastic amateurs, did much
through their work to dispel this illu-
sion here, and other similar associa-
tions carried on the good work In
other cities. A photographs salon,
which is an annual affair, has lately
been held in the Carnegie institute,
Pittsburgh. and the photopictorialists
throughout the country compose
large group Of sincere artists who
are doing much to raise the standard
of art appreciation. The Pictorial
Photographers of America includes
the majority OF these in its mem
bership and issues an annual year
book in the form of a report, repro
ducing notable prints by its MEM
bers. The original prints in the most
recent of these yearbooks are now
on view in the art and industries
building OF the National Museum and
give a very fair index to the progress
that has been made in this new art
OF course, there has been certain
amount of discussion between the
painters and the photographers as TO
whether or not the latter had the
right to consideration as creative
lartistS The pictorial photographers
have claimed that they used the
camera merely as medium OF eX-
preston. just as the painters used
pigment and paper or canvas. But
the photographers have been remind
ed by their brothers in art that they
had to transcrfbe things as they
We're, whereas the painter had the
opportunity of rearranging his com
position.
Sir Alfred East in his delightful
book on "Sketching From Nature"
claims that it is the painters pre-
roEative to complete natures s 1nten-
copy accurately what he sees. and
that herein lies the difference be
tween uninspired and the inspired,
the mere copyist and the artist; This
sounds logical and is reasonably sat
isfactory until. behold, another artist
Of distinction. John W. Beatty, ap-
pears and skaters the theory with
the statement that the greatest
artists have considered il their duty
to copy nature as accurately as posi-
Bile. taking no liberties.
IL Mr.. Beatty is right the pictorial
photographers should rejoice. for this
would put them on precisely the same
footing as the painters. Mr.. Beatty
contends that the painter must seek
for perfect compositions and desired
effects and when finding them en-
deavor to transcribe them accurately.
The pictorial photographer is obliged
TO do this. and IL is through his sue
cess in choice. not only of subject
scription. that the value and beauty
of his work depends. There is very
distinguished pictorial photographer
in Maine, Bertram Wentworth, who
has made specially OF winter pc
lures and of pictures of the sea. ana
he says that many times he has wait
ed for hours and days even weeks, to
have precisely the right effect to
photograph, and that when the effect
comes If he is not on hand II will be
! lost ofttimes before he can capture II.
Portrait Photography at its best Is
much the same. The pictorial pho
tographer who is an artist must be
able to pose his model as success
fully as the painter. to arrange mat
tiers of light and shade. and then to
seize at the right moment desired
expression.
There is a wide difference between
pictorial photography and photog-
raphy when employed rs witness.
The one takes into consideration the
elements of art-lost outlines. atmos-
phere. textures, mass, line-those
things which go to make up great
work of art. painted. etched. design
| ed. but when photography is called
in as a witness. as il often is in
matters pertaining to science, then
detail is the great objective. and
here the camera serves quite another
purpose.
Most recently color photography
has come TO the fore, and through
the medium of art as well as the
| camera and the lumiere plate ex-
traordinary possibilities have been
developed along this line. Under the
auspices of the National Geographic
tSociety Frederick Clatworthy recently
photography which should have con-
vinced the most prejudiced Skeptic
| that photography is indeed fine art
as it is practiced by some today.
plates technically fine. but they
showed in almost every instance that
subtle appreciation of artistic values
| which paintings by master painters
evidence. His compositions were ad-
mirably selected: his choices of light
/ ing. of color effects. were remark
able; and most marvellous of all
| were his prescriptions of sunsets. the
| luminous quality of the clouded skies
giving through the medium of light
what no painting could possibly give.
Furthermore. some of Mr.. Clat-
worthy's plates showed an eNtraordi-
| nary breadth of what in painting one
would call rendering: They did not
go too much into detail and they
| proved. what Birge Harrison has SO
! admirably set forth in his book on
Landscape Painting" that what We
/ see Is not always precisely what is
\ to be seen-that is, that the eye does
( not take in detail, but. to the con-
trary, comprehends effects. and that
herein is to be found the flaw in the
re-Raphaelite theory. This was also
| the stumbling block which caused the
downfall Of the Hudson river school
| of landscape painters. They tried to
paint what they knew rather than
what they saw. George Inness was