On “form.”
At the University of Cambridge, in our student days, it was considered “bad form” to give a testimonial to a tradesman for publication. This is still “bad form;” let the student, therefore, never let his name appear in the advertisement columns of photographic papers beneath a puff of some maker’s plates or some printing papers. “Good wine needs no bush.”
Value of a picture.
The value of a picture is not proportionate to the trouble and expense it costs to obtain it, but to the poetry that it contains.
“Good art.”
Good art only appeals to the highly cultivated at the first glance, but it gradually grows on the uncultivated, or the half cultivated; with bad art the case is otherwise.
Life of the model.
Give the life of the model in a portrait, not his bearing towards you during a mauvais quart d’heure.
Reflections and shadows.
Do not call reflections—shadows; learn to distinguish between the two.