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COLOUR PHOTOGRAPHY
AND OTHER RECENT DEVELOPMENTS OF THE ART OF THE CAMERA
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EDITED BY CHARLES HOLME
MCMVIII
OFFICES OF 4/THE STUDIO"
LONDON, PARIS & NEW YORK
1
PROVO,
PREFATORY NOTE.
IN considering the recent important developments which have taken place in photography, more especially as regards the question of colour, the fact should not be lost sight of that, notwithstanding the introduction of many improved processes during recent years, colour-photography is still in its infancy. It is, there- fore, the Editor's intention to deal with this important branch of the subject only as regards the results which have so far been obtained, and to do so with a view to contemplating its artistic possibilities rather than its scientific aspects.
Much has already been said and written about photography in relation to the Arts. Attempts have been made to draw comparisons between the work of the painter and that of the photographer ; and in dealing with colour-photography the tendency to join issue with the painter is naturally increased. But the Editor considers that it is to the best interests of photography that it should be regarded apart, and any artistic success that may be obtained is better judged on its own merits rather than by the standards set up by the painter or engraver. Endeavours to reproduce effects obtained by these artists are in themselves opposed to the spirit of true photo- graphy, and only display a lack of appreciation of the possibilities of the camera, and the opportunity it offers for the attainment of original effects. In this respect it is gratifying to find that many of the plates which have been submitted in connection with this volume bear distinct evidence of the independence of the photo- grapher, and justify the belief that colour-photography will be developed on original and progressive lines.
Whilst photography in natural colours cannot be regarded as an entirely new development, it is only quite recently that it has been brought within the range of practical pictorial work by the intro- duction of the autochrome plate, and fourteen of the coloured illustrations given here are reproduced from plates of this nature. In selecting them the Editor has endeavoured to show various effects that can be obtained by the process ; and, apart from any artistic qualities they may possess, it is interesting to note the different results which some of the leading photographers have arrived at in using these plates. No pains have been spared to give in each case a true repre- sentation of the autochrome as it appears when held up to the light ; but it will be readily understood that, owing to the peculiar nature of the originals — which exist, of course, only as transparencies — these coloured reproductions are exceedingly difficult to accomplish. Similar care has been bestowed upon the illustrations in monochrome
A 2
in order that the quality of the original print may, in each case, be rendered as closely as possible. These illustrations speak for them- selves, and it has not been considered necessary to refer to them at any length in the article. Moreover, the subject of artistic photo- graphy has been fully discussed in the Special Summer Number of "The Studio" for 1905, entitled " Art in Photography." The Editor desires to tender his thanks to all those who have so readily come forward to assist him in the preparation of this volume by allowing their work to be reproduced, and to others who sub- mitted examples which are only excluded owing to want of space or because they arrived too late.
i
ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOUR
No.
Portrait of Mrs. Greiffenhagen. By J. Craig Annan (autochrome) I
Portrait of Miss Jessie M. King. By J. Craig Annan (autochrome) 8
A Late Winter Sun. By Dr. H. Bachmann .(gum print) 15
The Blue Dress. By Alvin Langdon Coburn (autochrome) 22
Autumn Landscape. By Alvin Langdon Coburn (autochrome) 31
The Lady in Red. By Alvin Langdon Coburn (autochrome) 38
The Sisters. By Frank Eugene (autochrome) 45
A Sunlit Street, Berne. By J. Dudley Johnston (gum print) 51
Portrait Group. By Heinrich Kuhn (autochrome) 57
Playmates. By Heinrich Kiihn (autochrome) 63
Stiff Life. By Baron A. De Meyer (autochrome) 69
Still Life. By Baron A. De Meyer (autochrome) 75
Still Life. By Baron A. De Meyer (autochrome) 81
Portrait of " Mrs. W. M." By G. E. H. Rawlins (autochrome) 87
Landscape. By G. Bernard Shaw (autochrome) 93
Christmas Roses. By F. W. Urquhart (autochrome) 98
The Thames. By E. Warner (oil print) 105
An Old Waterway, Exeter. By E. Warner (oil print) no
ILLUSTRATIONS IN MONOCHROME
The Bonfire. By Frances Allen 2
Bed-time. By Frances Allen 4
Boy with Hoop. By Mary Allen 3
Book-plate. By J. Craig Annan 5
Stonyhurst College. By J. Craig Annan 6
Stirling Castle. By J. Craig Annan 7
To Leeward. By Malcolm Arbuthnot 9
The Donkeyman. By Malcolm Arbuthnot 10
The River. By Malcolm Arbuthnot 1 1
Bankside. By Malcolm Arbuthnot 12
Evening Silhouette. By Malcolm Arbuthnot 13
A Tangle after a Storm. By Walter Benington 14
The Church of England. By Walter Benington 16
The Thaw. By Annie W. Brigman 1 7
The Sweets Shop. By Eustace Calland 18
Illustrations in Monochrome — continued
The White Sail. By Alvin Langdon Coburn
The Silver Cup. By Alvin Langdon Coburn
Santa Maria Delia Salute. By Alvin Langdon Coburn
Lambeth Reach. By Fannie E. Coburn
A Flower Woman. By Fannie E. Coburn
On the Maas, near Dordrecht. By R. Lincoln Cocks
The Stadhuis Tower, Veere. By R. Lincoln Cocks
Lowestoft Harbour — A Rainy Day. By Reginald Craigie
Finishing Touches. By Dwight A. Davis
Harlech. By George Davison
The Onion Field. By George Davison
Honfleur. By Robert Demachy
Falaise. By Robert Demachy
Louise. By Robert Demachy
The Seine at Clichy. By Robert Demachy Study of a Head. By C. J. Von Diihren
Portrait. By R. DCihrkoop
Spring. By Leopold Ebert
By the Sacred Gate, Algiers. By Gustavus Eisen
Minuet. By Frank Eugene
The Bridge. By J. H. Field
Study of a Head. By Siri Fischer-Schneevoigt
Portrait. By David Octavius Hill
Greyfriars Churchyard. By David Octavius Hill
Portrait of a Boy. By David Octavius Hill
Portrait. By David Octavius Hill
Church Porch in Altmunster. By Dr. Julius Hofmann
St. Vigilio del Garva. By T. & O. Hofmeister
Houses and Poplars. By T. & O. Hofmeister
Autumn Sunshine. By Charles Job
Snow in the City. By J. Dudley Johnston
The White Bridge. By J. Dudley Johnston
Liverpool — An Impression. By J. Dudley Johnston
The Broken Pitcher. By Gertrude Kasebier
Portrait. By Gertrude Kasebier
The Letter. By Gertrude Kasebier
Josephine. By Gertrude Kasebier
No.
J9
20
21
23 24
25 26
27
109
28
29
30 32
33 34 31 3S 36 in
39 112
40
41
42
43
44
46
47 48
49 50 52 53 54 55 56 58
Illustrations in Monochrome — continued ^
The Bridge. By Alexander Keighley 59
Spring Pastoral. By Alexander Keighley 60
Portrait of " Mrs. De C." By Joseph T. Keiley 61
Courtyard at Weissenkirchen. By Hermann C. Kosel 62
Tn the Dunes. By Heinrich Kiihn 64
Study. By Heinrich Kiihn 65
The Hilltop. By Heinrich Kiihn 66
Luiz Lopez. By Baron A. de Meyer 67
Gitana of Granada ("Bonita"). By Baron A. de Meyer 68
Portrait of Mrs. Brown-Potter. By Baron A. de Meyer 70
Helen. By Hervey W. Minns 113
The Majestic Main. By F. J. Mortimer 71
Don Quixote — Self Portrait. By Cavendish Morton 72
The Dancer. By Cavendish Morton 73
Lise-Lotte. By Cavendish Morton 74
Portrait. By Dr. Felix Muhr 76
Landscape. By Ward Muir 77
After the Snowstorm. By Ward Muir 78
Landscape. By H. W. Miiller 70
Landscape. By H. W. Miiller 80
Portrait. By Nicola Perscheid 82
Arcadia. By Paul Pichier 83
Steps at the Villa d'Este, Tivoli. By Paul Pichier 84
Bohemian Landscape. By Karel Prokop 8 c
And more to come. By G. E. H. Rawlins 86
The Pianist. By Guido Rey 88
Milking Time. By Guido Rey 89
Eileen. By Eva Watson Schiitze oo
Mother and Child. By Eva Watson Schiitze 91
Tribute. By George H. Seeley n2
The Dawn. By George H. Seeley 04
The Crystal. By George H. Seeley gr
Autumn. By George H. Seeley 96
The White Screen. By George H. Seeley 97
Horses. By Alfred Stieglitz 99
Goats — Decorative Landscape. By Alfred Stieglitz 100
In the New York Central Yards — Snapshot. By Alfred Stieglitz 101
Illustrations in Monochrome — continued No
" Miss C." — Study. By Alfred Stieglitz and Clarence H. White 102
Notre Dame. By W. Orison Underwood 103
Portrait of a Boy. By Clarence H. White 104
Landscape with Figure. By Clarence H. White 106
Portrait of " A. L. C." By Clarence H. White 107
Portrait of Mrs. White. By Clarence H. White 108
COLOUR PHOTOGRAPHY
HE most vivid and arresting, if not actually the most valuable, of all the recent developments associated with Photography's name is that deli- cate discovery of the Brothers Lumiere — the flower of a long course of painful experiments in chromo-culture — which has given the worker power to keep the intrinsic colours of his theme intact ; and we have accordingly thought it proper to devote this article to a consideration of the autochrome process, of the aesthetic value of its results, of the validity of their claim to serious artistic regard. And there is another and a deeper reason for this distinction. Just as a drop of actual pigment will instantly transform a glass of clear water, so the introduction of this element of colour immediately and profoundly changes the character of the issues involved, the nature of the conclusions we may have formed regarding the Photographer's right and title, the human value and purpose of the pictures he produces.
But let not the autochromist on that account be emboldened to indulge in any complacent mockery at the expense of the critical function ; for, so doing, he might provoke a rather deadly retort. For, indeed, it seems highly questionable whether the auto- chromist, or the colour photographer of any kind, is yet entitled to receive attentions from art critics, whether he is not bound to be considered — if not always, at least for the present — simply as the adroit exponent of a singular mechanical device, a device possessing much of profound scientific value, producing results which, as records, memoranda, souvenirs, are of quite intense interest and some considerable charm. The autochrome pictures in this volume, for instance : can it really be said of them that they compel that swift unmistakable stir of the senses — half rustle ot contentment, half thrill of disquiet, which is the body's signal or the presence of authentic art ? Let the reader turn to them again. Let him pass them slowly in review, deliberately inhaling the odd quality — piquant, curious, staccato — which they all, in their various degrees, possess. Never before has it been possible to arraign so representative a series ; autochromes by workers so diverse in their distinction as Mr. Bernard Shaw and Mr. Heinrich Kiihn have never before been laid side by side ; and the unique image on the Lumiere transparent " positive " has never hitherto been reproduced with so much sensitive and meticulous loyalty. The reader can be certain, therefore, that he is at least dealing fairly with the new
COLOUR PHOTOGRAPHY craft. All the evidence lies openly before him ; it merely remains for him to authorise his senses to deliver sentence frankly. And as he listens to that nervous pronouncement I think that he will find, almost without exception, that it falls into two main divisions. Each of these divisions is prefaced by a brief spurt of quick wonder, itself a kind of pleasure indeed, but of no more real account than a formal introduction to a speech : it is only when that delight in the mere novelty of the thing, that admiration for its ingenuity, has briskly effervesced and faded that the really funda- mental utterance begins to reach him. He is looking, let us say, at Mr. Bernard Shaw's little landscape (No. 93) — the grey church tower rising up among the autumn leafage, the slant of cloudless sky ascending sharply behind ; and he finds that his sensation is almost precisely that which he gets when he looks at a piece ot nature through the wrong end of a telescope — the effect or a sharpened and acidulated nature, a nature curiously tense and glittering, almost metallic. And he turns from this, let us say, to such an ambitious figure-study as Mr. Kuhn's " Playmates " (No. 63), a piece of deliberate picture-making, with models posed and equipped ; and he finds here, just as inevitably, that the effect is that of a picture which has been suddenly robbed of all those deli- cate nerves and tendons of pervasive colour-chords, the sly echoes and running threads, which the painter uses to pull his work into one mounting accordance. Those are the two sensations, one or other of which, in a greater or a less degree, will be provoked by almost all the colour-pictures in this book. The spectator finds on the one hand, that is to say, that his enjoyment is never more than that which comes from hearing a rather tart echo of Nature. Or he finds, on the other, that his enjoyment is always less than that which comes in the presence of a painted picture. These are significant conclusions. Before we accept them as final, however — before we enforce the verdict which they seem to make inevitable, there is yet one court of appeal to which the case can be referred. For these slight divergencies — the absence of those uniting threads of colour, the presence of that hard open-air asperity — might be merely the result of the temporary clumsinesses and uncertainties which follow the acquisition of any new power : as the fingers grow more skilful, the secret of those sly interweavings may be acquired, some method of sweetening that tartness be discovered. We must attempt, therefore, to ascertain how far these qualities are inherent and therefore irremediable, or how far they are accidental and momentary. We must approach the matter 2
COLOUR PHOTOGRAPHY
from the point of view of technique. We must consider its material endowment, and attempt some definition of its especial physical basis.
Now the instrument that actually effects a revolution is almost always a quite light and piquant thing, a bright, explicit culmination — like the barb that tips a spear. A statesman sums up a vague policy in an epigram, and instantly the great change is accomplished ; a loose and lumbering conviction has but to pass into a proverb — and it rules the mind of a nation as firmly as a natural law ; and the achievement of the Brothers Lumiere, like so many other epoch- making discoveries, is in reality little more than a peculiarly delicate and adroit epitome of the principles involved in the cumbrous and distended processes of any number of detached and unsuccessful workers. The striped plates of Dr. Joly of Dublin, the not dis- similar " Florence " experiments of Powrie of Chicago — the practically identical process invented by MacDonough in America — the old theoretical method of Becquerel — the more famous but no less labyrinthine, laborious and impractical processes of Lippmann : the laws and convictions embedded in all these efforts, on the one hand, and the trichromatic principles involved in the experiments or Ducos du Hauron and Cros and their successors and allies on the other hand, have all been neatly epitomized, by these two French scientists, in a kind of physical epigram — all the clutter of laboratory auxiliaries which broke the back of the first kind of effort being neatly summed up on the surface of a single plate, and all the treble exposures, subsequent syntheses, and so forth, which group about the second, being brusquely concentrated into a single exposure and a solitary self-sufficient image. The Clark- Maxwells and the Lipp- manns laboriously shaped the shaft, brought the principles together, and hammered them roughly into shape. It was left to the Lumieres to fit the pungent barb, and so, with one deft touch, transform a rude and barbarous curiosity into a glittering revolutionary weapon. The result of this, or at least one of the results, is that whilst it would take a full volume to explain the useless process of Lipp- mann, the triumphantly practical methods of the Lumieres can be described in a couple of sentences. Starch-grains coloured green, starch-grains coloured violet, and starch-grains coloured orange (green, violet, and orange being, of course, the three prime colours) are equally commingled, so that they seem to form a uniform grey dust, and are then densely and adroitly marshalled, some four millions to the square inch, on the surface of a single plate ; and it is over this fabulous army that the sensitive film of panchromatic emulsion,
COLOUR PHOTOGRAPHY the chemical prison which captures the image, is delicately out- stretched. The result of this elaborate and perfect ambush is a complete surrender on the part of the colour-rays. No matter what its nature, no matter whence it emanates, the arriving ray can find no portion of the plate unoccupied by a battalion of starch-grains perfectly aware of its peculiar weaknesses, perfectly fitted to deal with it in exactly the most appropriate way. Challenged, interro- gated, disarmed, and captured thus subtly and infallibly, it is at last transferred, in a state of naked exactness, to its due place in the transparent positive ; and there, in the company of countless other rays similarly entrapped, it builds up that precise image of church, or cloud, or child, from which the reproduction in this book was ultimately made.
An exquisite automatic delicacy resulting in an image of unyielding exactness — that, then, is the physical basis of this autochrome process ; and our task is to discover what manner of aesthetic structure it is possible to erect on such a base. And when we examine the case for Autochrome in this bare way, picked clean and reduced to its simplest elements, two decidedly ominous circumstances begin to thrust themselves forward. For we find, in the first place, that the " exquisite automatic delicacy " is oi such a jealous nature that it becomes the stern enemy of all subsequent delicacies. And we find, in the second, that the "unyielding exactness" of the image is veracious in that fanatical way which is really a kind of fierce falsehood, that the image is truer to Nature than Nature is true to herself, so implacably precise that it is in effect a distortion.
Let us consider these two momentous attributes in turn. ... As to the first, it must be evident to all that the moment the human hand creates a machine of greater delicacy than itself, it instantly surrenders its right to intervene and shrinks into subordination. That,^ at all events, is precisely what has happened here. The subtlety of this autochrome instrument, the exquisite nature of the operations conducted by those incredibly well-drilled battalions ot billions of delicate discs, makes it absolutely impossible for the human hand to interfere in any way, to offer to aid or to modify the plan of attack, to introduce a partial armistice or to release any of the colours once they have been made captive. The operator has to stand helplessly aside whilst these lilliputian Frankensteins of his creation automatically conduct their own unswerving campaign. All other recent developments in photography have been curiously complementary : with every development of the scientific side of its
4
COLOUR PHOTOGRAPHY
nature there has generally marched a corresponding and balancing development of the aesthetic side — apparatus of increasing exactness being equalised by new licences conferred on the operator — the orthochromatic plate (let us say) being counterbalanced by the Rawlins Oil Process. But in the case of this last vivid development no such complementary freedom has thus far been conferred. It would seem as though Science, swollen by the marvellous nature of her latest achievement, had grown intolerant of control or interruption ; had decided to keep the whole matter rigidly in her own hands. U intervention, at all events, is utterly impossible in autochrome work- Creation by Manipulation is forbidden in colour work ; and one of the three pathways by which alone the photographer can hope to reach the summit of the Sacred Hill is thus rigidly barricaded. And when we turn to the second of those ominous physical cir- cumstances, to the extravagant accuracy of the final image, this total inability to modify appears a yet more serious defect, the vivid chains of office with which Science has loaded the worker bear a still more striking resemblance to actual fetters and gyves. It is this extravagant accuracy, of course, this fanatical truthful- ness, which is responsible, in landscape-work, for that odd effect of acidity, of asperity, which we noticed at the outset ; and it is scarcely more difficult to prove its inevitability than it is to demonstrate its existence. For Delacroix's canary-coloured cab has not driven round the world's studios in vain, and the theory of complementary colours is as popular a piece of knowledge as even the Darwinian theory. We all know that when we survey a landscape we do not see each colour independently, at its intrinsic value, but that all sorts of strange feuds and alliances going on between the colours as they settle themselves in the chambers of the eye result in an image curiously interwoven and interdependent — this colour being subordinated to that, another thrilling warmly in response to the attentions of a fourth, a fifth and six entering darkly into a sinister suicidal pact. Detach any one colour from the sweep of sea, sky, field, and shore — guard it with your hands, as you look at it, so that it may be held free from the interference of its neighbours, and you will find that its colour is a very different thing from that which it wears when you let your hands fall and the whole great company of yellows, blues, and greens burst upon the sight at once. The actual intrinsic yellow of the sand is flushed almost to flesh-colour by the vivid green of the grass ; the water beyond it deepens its blue a little in response to the glow of the beach ; and even the purple distance behind you,
COLOUR PHOTOGRAPHY the long range of rolling woods whose aspect still rings and echoes subtly in your senses, is not without a secret influence, inducing the whole orchestration to vary its tone some fine and delicate degrees further.
But the Lumiere plate, freed from the frailties of the human eye, sternly represses these chromatic love-matches and quarrels. The colour that it registers is the native colour : the valid, separate blue of the sea — the independent gold of the shore — the green of the grass as the grass would seem if the world were one vast prairie. The result, when the eye turns from scene to picture, from original to unflinching reflection, is a sharp sense of shock, an acute metallic thrill. The senses, perhaps, strive to reorganise the colours, attempt to mollify the rigour ; and it is possible (although it cannot yet be stated with any certainty) that they do manage to work the colours together into something more nearly approaching the suavity of the image they derive from Nature. But it is a feat which they are physiologically debarred from performing successfully : the difference between the size of the three-dimensional original and the two-dimensional repro- duction inevitably baffles them ; and the autochrome landscape remains something of a cold bath, a little discomforting and austere, — something very far removed from either that sensuous illusion called nature, or that voluptuous reality called art. " But herein," it may be urged, " lies, surely, one clear and obvious method of creation. Since the effect of the picture is so different from the effect of the original, and since ' Art is art because it is not nature,' may it not be that it is by dint of just this piquant and acerb disparity that the autochromist will be enabled to provide beautiful and enduring bodies for emotions which would otherwise remain intangible and untransmittable. Creation by Manipulation, you point out, is clearly barred. Granted ; but what about a second pathway, Creation by Pure Technique ? Does it not seem as though this extra keenness and acidity of the colours, this slight change in their relations, pro- vided the autochromatic equivalent to that exchange of colour for tone, of nature-quality for process-quality, which may be regarded as one of the proofs of the monochromist's claim to the royal rank of artist ? "
It is a good argument and entirely pertinent ; and it would, in addition, be entirely conclusive if it dealt with any other element in life than this extraordinary element of colour. Were the modifi- cation a matter of tonal-modification, or even of lineal, then the 6
COLOUR PHOTOGRAPHY
resultant picture would still, quite probably, be beautiful. Were it merely a case of darkening a sweep of grey or changing the values of a monochromatic pattern or altering the distribution of light and shade, then the disturbance might well evolve something new and strange but still entirely lovely. But the beauty of colour is a thing that stands apart. No other kind of loveliness is so fragile ; none is guarded by laws whose least infraction is visited with sterner or more instant punishment. There is no deep edict which declares that an angle of 400 is infallibly exquisite but one of 3 8° an intolerable outrage; but there is an irrevocable principle in Nature which asserts that purple and gold are a splendid har- mony, but that purple and pink form an aesthetic crime. There are no rigid rules which define the exact shade of grey which must appear beside a certain tone of black ; but there is an eternal law which thunderously condemns as unhallowed the marriage of mauve and magenta. The last great peace will have arrived before the fierce hostility of puce and vermilion will have been finally patched up. The morals and religions of men may melt and waver inter- minably, but the mating of certain colours will always strike the mind into a sudden agony of horror, as though in the presence of something actually obscene.
A perfect arrangement of colour, then, is something far too sensitive — rests upon a framework far too exquisite and frail — for any rough- and-ready transmutations. Nothing is rarer than a perfect eye for colour ; nothing in the whole range of art is more difficult to evolve than a conclusive and elaborate colour-scheme : how, then, can we expect this haphazard transition of the autochromist, carried through rigidly and mechanically, without any guidance or control from the human hand, to result in anything save discord ? Once in an endless series of experiments, indeed, the miracle may happen, and a new and intricate harmony wonderfully emerge. But exceptions of this sort prove no artistic rule ; they are happy accidents, disenfranchised children of chance ; they give the operator no right to call himself their creator ; they do not sanctify the art to which they come. . . . Equally with the manipulatory avenue, then, this route ot Creation by Pure Technique is barred to the colour-photographer ; for he lacks as well that keyboard of alternative processes which the Davisons, the Coburns, the Craig Annans, in their delicate, non- colour moments, play upon so delightfully. There accordingly remains to be considered only the third of the pathways — that form of photographic artistry, of temperamental expression, which may be called Creation by Isolation.
7
COLOUR PHOTOGRAPHY And it is here, it seems to me, that the aesthetic possibilities ot autochrome are chiefly to be found ; it is certainly to this province, at all events, that the most successful and most satisfying auto- chromes in this book (I will name them in a moment), without exception, belong. At the same time, one is compelled to confess that the difficulties, even here, are enormous. Ransacking the magnificent clutter and waste-heap of Nature for that fine fragment, that odd, unrealised trifle, whose beauty would seem non-natural and new in isolation, the monochromist has always to bear in mind, not only the need for novelty but also the necessity for beauty — for beauty of line, mass, tone, disposition, curve ; and the necessity for seeing these things in relation to the ultimate little niche for which he designs it — in relation to the boundary lines of his print and in the especial terms of his process — is, as we have seen, one of the main difficulties of his task. But in the case of the colour- worker this vast difficulty is multiplied to positively nightmare proportions by the simultaneous need for discovering, coincident with this beauty of mass, line, distribution, and so forth, that much rarer and more perishable thing, a perfect melody of colour. Very often, ot course, in the midst of the lavish out-of-door design, you do find neglected colour-harmonies of quite exquisite perfection. The painter knows these things, seeks them out, studies them diligently, learns all their secrets, and then uses them for his private ends. But he nourishes no hope of finding them coincident with the harmonies of mass and line. He nurses no mad expectation of discovering Nature singing a duet. He is content to find his lineal melody in one place, his chromatic melody in another, and then, by dint of his own craft, to blend and interweave them artfully, so that they ring out from his canvas perfectly braided and attuned.
No such trick or combination, as we have seen, is in any wise possible to the autochromist ; and he, accordingly, must idealisti- cally fix his hopes upon the presumptive existence, somewhere in the labyrinth, of that wonderful coincidence, that miraculous and abnormal duet. He must search landscape after landscape, and pierce deep into the dense jungle of reality, upheld by nothing more tangible than the faint theoretical hope, that, somewhere in nature, since there is a Law of Average, those two voices will be heard rising up in faultless and exquisite accord. It is not a quest one wholly envies him ; but in common fairness one admits the possibility ot a successful issue ; and one earnestly wishes him success.
8
COLOUR PHOTOGRAPHY
And in common fairness, too, one gladly admits as well that when he deserts landscape for genre work, for a certain kind of por- traiture, and (especially) for a certain sort of still-life treatment, he reduces the difficulties of the game so considerably that he makes it a very genuine and legitimate mode of activity. For, once indoors, he can himself play the part of deus ex machina, and, descending to the role of stage-manager, can drag properties hither and thither until he succeeds in producing something which contains that much-desired coincidence. It is not, perhaps, the lightest or airiest of tasks ; it compares somewhat drably with the less manual activities of the painter ; for he has to do laboriously and physi- cally what the brush accomplishes by a single flicker and dab. But that he can accomplish the task and give us, as a result, certain sensations of rich and delicate value, some of the flower-studies of Baron de Meyer — which form perhaps the most successful auto- chromes in this book — testify quite completely. His " Still-life," with the General Jacqueminots drooping so delightfully out of the delicately chosen bowl is distinctly a piece of creation (No. j$) : it is itself beautiful ; its beauty has been deliberately captured, the product of a decisive effort of " imaginative reason " ; and it is a beauty recondite and remote, very different from the rather dis- tracting and insouciant beauty which would emanate from the actual flowers, the actual bowl and drapery. And even more perfect is the dexterous and memorable little arrangement in red-bronze and lacquer-green (No. 69). These two pictures are certainly pieces of art, their maker (even if he had produced no monochrome pictures) would certainly have proved his right to the ancient and honourable title.
It is by a similar process of stage carpentry that the other pictures which seem to me most successful have been granted the beauty that saves them : Mr. Coburn's " Blue Dress " (No. 22) and his " Lady in Red" (No. 38) ; Mr. Rawlins's " Mrs. W. M." (No. 87) ; Mr. Craig Annan's curious experiment in greens (No. 8) ; Mr. Kuhn's decidedly ambitious portrait-group of three (No. $y). In all of these the groupings have been done leisurely and deliberately ; the picture has been prepared as one prepares a stage-picture ; the Camera has merely been used to perpetuate it. And that method, it seems to me, is the only one by which the autochromist can hope, as yet, to produce pictures which are anything more than valuable records, significant and curious memo- randa, adroit exemplifications of a singular scientific discovery. " As yet." . . . Inevitably, one adds that safe-guard ; for " the
b 9
COLOUR PHOTOGRAPHY future," as the Japanese say, " is full of occasions," and one can scarcely doubt that to-morrow, or to-morrow's morrow, will bring a fresh discovery, a new development, which will perhaps replace the right of control in the worker's hands, and restore to him the sway momentarily usurped by Science. It is a fascinating possi- bility ; it stands as a kind of gateway to a kingdom of curious and enchanting speculations. But the present writer has already rigidly refused to play the part of prophet ; and through this attractive gateway he sternly declines to be lured.
And, indeed, what he would rather suggest, in conclusion, is that Photography's true sphere, the place where she catches the hot instant on tip-toe, and perfectly prisons it for ever, must always be the world of monochrome ; for colour is too frail and sensitive a thing to submit to these sudden pouncings and butterfly captures. He would suggest that the Photographer should realise that quite clearly — not in order that he may experiment in autochrome less seriously, but that he may push his researches and experiments in monochrome more audaciously and vigorously still. For there, surely, tasks great enough and precious enough to satisfy the most ambitious still await his hand.
DIXON SCOTT.
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