Evening star., 1939-01-01
Old Carolina Plantation Home
Photographically Interpreted
BU Frances Renjn1nin Johnston.

Photographically Interpreted
By Frances Benjamin Johnston.
The artistic merit of Frances Ben
jamin Johnstons photographs is so
well known that it needs no expo
sitlon, but were this not the case
convincing evidence would be found
in the series of 70 Photographic
illustrations which she has contrib
uted to the handsome folio, Plan
tations OF the Carolina Low Coun-
try lately published by the Caro-
lima Art Association OF Charleston,
S. c., the first edition of which has
already been exhausted.
AS of the 234 pages which make
up this book, only IS are given over
to text, and the rest to illustration.
it is primarily pictorial record and
may therefore be regarded as an
exhibition between covers rather
than written document In fact,
all considered, this publication is a
remarkable piece of correlation of
the arts, to which architects, au-
thors, photographers and printers of
outstanding reputation gave of their
best.
Realizing the havoc wrought by
disuse and the finger of time, the
compilers of the historical data here
contained South Carolinians by
birth and heritage, and. incidentally.
architects, fellows of the American
Institute Of Architects-began the
work of collection in 1928, en-
couraged and supported by a no less
interested and sympathetic colleague
in Boston, William Emeeon, at
whose instance Ben Judah Lubschez,
experienced in architectural pho
Biography, was sent South to make
certain photographs. With tremen-
dous zeal, weekly expeditions were
made to remote places by the
Charleston group, to make accurate
measurements and drawings of
houses, reduced to ruins by earth
quake, war and storms, to which
they picked their way through
briars and rattlesnakes," at no small
personal peril.
Then came the depression and for
nearly 10 years all that had been
done was laid aside, but the idea
tarried in the mind of its originator,
Albert Simons, F. A. I. A. Repeated
attempts to bring out the publica-
ton failed, but all the time success
seemed, and was, just around the
corner. The Carolina Art Associa-
ton, which is the governing body
OF the Gibbes Memorial Art Gallery,
In 1888 assumed the responsibility
OF publication and secured the as
slStance of the American Council of
Learned Societies, through which a
grant was secured for more photo
graphs by Frances Benjamin john
ston-and, behold, the impossible
was achieved. AS the writer of the
foreWord states. 1T was inevitable"
The value of the publication is
twofold-to record the past and to
make contribution to the future. IT
place the value high" says John
Mead Howells, architect of New
York, in his introduction. Why?
Because the plates showing old
American homes furnish basic ma
terial for new American homes-in
their simplicity, adaptation of ma
terials to climatic requirements, and,
above all, to the life to be lived
therein. Not only, he insists, do
these plantation homes of old pos
sess interest to the purist in early
American styles, but to the mod
ernist, because of the straightfor-
wardness of architectural treatment.
All this the pictorial representation
confirms.
Mention has already been made
of the merit of Miss Johnston's
Photography, but to some it may be
a matter of perplexity how in the
photograph of building there
can be sufficient scope for the ex-
ercise of artistic ability. The secret
is this: IN practically all of her
photographs Miss Johnston renders
not merely the factual, but what,
for lack of more explicit word,
may be called the spiritual. Not
merely bricks and mortar, stone and
wood, but the atmosphere surround
ing them. This atmosphere has in
a measure to do with setting, and
the angle of vision, but more still
is it dependent upon the play of
light, its quality and its inter-
relation to shadow. Winter SUM-
light is totally different, as every
one must know, from sunlight of
spring or midsummer; a building
seen in early morning or late after
noon may have no semblance what
soever to that which is seen when
the sun Is high in the heavens.
This, better than almost any pic
torial photographer of today,
France Benjamin Johnston knows
and puts to account,