Naturalistic Photography for Students of the Art.

by P. H. Emerson

The horny-handed engineer, too, is wooing her; he makes love to her away down in dark caissons half-buried in river beds; whilst above-ground she scatters his plans far and wide. He uses her to show how his works are growing beneath the strong arms of his horny-handed gangs, and he even uses her to determine the temperature of the depths of the sea, and the direction of oceanic currents; yes, she does the work for him and he loves her. |Medicine and Biology.| The earnest doctor and the curious biologist are amongst her lowers, and the dainty one does not disdain their work, for she knows it to be good; for though she is fickle, she is kind at heart. For them she goes into the mysterious globe of the eye; down into the hollow larynx; and into the internal ear; and drags forth drawings. The tumour-deformed leg, the tossing epileptic, the deformed leprous body, the ulcerous scalp, the unsightly skin disease, the dead brain, the delicate dissection, the galloping horse, the flying gull, and erring man does she with quick and dainty strokes draw and give her lovers the physician and biologist.

Military and naval services.

Then like the Valkyria she too delights in dire war. For her heroes she writes so finely that her letters are carried in a quill beneath a pigeon’s wing into and out of beleaguered cities. She draws hasty notes of the country for the leaders of an invading army; she preserves a record of the killed and she gives truthful drawings of the fields of battle and of the poor torn and jaded men after a battle; whilst in times of peace she draws for the officer the effects of the explosion of a shell, the path of a bullet through the air, or the water thrown on high, like a geyser, by a hidden torpedo. |Forensic medicine.| She is the warder’s friend too, for she draws the skulking thief, the greedy forger, and the cruel murderer; she draws, too, the knife that stabbed in the dark, and the dress all blood-besmirched; she detects the forged bank note, and draws without quibble the position of the overturned and splintered railway car; and she shows the scorched and gutted ruins of the burnt house for the insurance agent. |Libraries.| She has her fun, too, for she twits the librarians with the ever increasing deluge of books, and hints laughingly they must one day come to her, for she will show them how to keep a library in a tea-caddy. |Industrial arts.| The haggling tradesman she does not disdain, she will draw portraits of his fabrics to be circulated all over the world, she will copy the bad paintings and drawings done for him as advertisements by the pariahs of art. She reproduces trade-marks and signatures, and oh, naughty goddess! she even, on the sly, copies on old yellow paper old etchings and engravings so that the connoisseur does not know the new from the old. She helps in all kinds of advertising, reproducing the scenery by railways for the railway companies, sketching topographically for tourists, drawing mothers and fathers and children for the world, so that the loved ones can go across the seas and leave themselves behind in form and feature. And so that the dead may not be forgotten she soothes the living with their dear faces done in her pretty way. Nay, she even goes so far as to allow her works to be burnt on porcelain and sold in brooches, on plates and other ware.

Art.

Nor do the children love you in vain, pretty goddess, for you give them magic-lanterns, and invisible pictures of yourself; to be made visible by a little secret you tell them. You give them magic cigar-holders and stereoscopes, all this out of your bountiful lap do you scatter; but, pretty dainty light-bearer, have you no love dearer to you than all these, is there none amongst your wooers that you prefer? Yes, blush not, oh, dainty one, it is the artist who sees in you a subtler, finer aid than his sorry hand, so monkey-like in its fumblings. To him you give your delicate drawings on zinc to illustrate his books, or on copper to fill his portfolios, to him you give poems of the winds whispering amongst the reed-beds, of the waves roaring in the grey gloaming, of the laughing, bright-eyed mortal sisters of yours. To him, your favoured one, your chief love, you give the subtlety of drawing of the wind-shorn and leaf-bare oak, the spirit of the wild colts on the flowery marsh, the ripple of the river and the glancing flight of the sea-fowl. Together you and he spend days and nights, mid the streams and the woods, culling the silvery flowers of nature. Oh! bright generous little goddess, who has stolen the light from the sun for mortals, and brought it to them not in a narthex reed as did Prometheus bring his living spark, but in silvery drops to be moulded to your lover’s wish, be he star-gazer, light-breaker, wonder-seeker, sea-fighter or land-fighter, earth-roamer, seller-of-goods, judger-of-crimes, lover-of-toys, builder-of-bridges, curer-of-ills, or lover of the woods and streams.

The influence of photography on the sister arts of sculpture, painting, engraving, etching and wood-cutting during these fifty years has been tremendous, as have they influenced in turn photography. Sculpture has been, perhaps, least influenced, although without photography thousands of posthumous statues which now grace the streets and the squares of the world could not have been modelled at all, or could only have been very conventionally and unsatisfactorily modelled. As it is, they are often excellent portraits. The effect of sculpture on photography has been to induce experimentalists to attempt a production of models in clay by means of an instrument called a pantograph. It is reported that these methods succeeded, but we never saw any of the productions and have little faith in the methods.

The influence of photography on painting, on the other hand, has been nothing short of marvellous, as can be seen in the great general improvement in the drawing of movement. It is a common practice for painters to take photographs of their models and throw enlargements of these on to a screen when the outlines are boldly sketched in. Again, it is a practice for painters to study the delicate tonality of photography, which is of course quite legitimate. Another influence of photography on painting is that the painter often tries to emulate the detail of the photograph. But this was more noticeable in the early days of photography, and it had a bad effect on painting, for the painter did not know enough of photography to know that what he was striving to imitate was due to an ignorant use of the art. He thought, as many people think now-a-days, that there is an absolute and unvarying quality in all photographs. The effect on miniature painting was disastrous; it has been all but killed by photography, and we think rightly. And it must be remembered that photography killed it notwithstanding the fact that many of the best miniature painters adopted the new art as soon as they could. Newton was a photographer. Photography also killed the itinerant portrait painter who used to stump the country and paint hideous portraits for a few shillings, or a night’s lodging. Photography too, has, unfortunately, been the cause of a vast production of weak and feeble water-colours, oil-paintings and etchings. Second and third rate practitioners of these arts have simply copied photographs and supplied the colouring from their imagination, and thousands of feeble productions has been the result; this is a dishonest use of photography, but one by no means uncommon. We often have food for reflection on the gullibility of man, when we see poor paintings and etchings exhibited at “one man” exhibitions and elsewhere, which are nothing but ruined photographs; the very drawing shows that, and the time in which such a collection of paintings is painted also hints at the method. All the drawing has been done by the photographic lens, and transferred to the panel or canvas. These are the very men who decry photography. Such work is only admissible if confessed, but of course such people as this keep their method quite secret. The etchings done in this way are simply impudent. The influence of painting on photography has been great and good as a factor in the cultivation of the æsthetic faculty, but its conventionality has often been harmful.

As we have said, by the aid of photography feeble painters and etchers are able to produce fairly passable work, where otherwise their work would have been disgraceful. Wood-cutters and line engravers too gain much help from us, but they find photography a rival that will surely kill them both. We have gone into this vexed question in detail in the body of this work. One of the best and most noted wood engravers since Bewick’s time has given it as his opinion that there is no need for wood engraving now that the “processes” can so truly reproduce pictures, for, as he says, no great original genius in wood-cutting will ever be kept back by “process work,” and it is a good thing that all others should be killed.

The chief thing which at present oppresses photography is “the trade.” Print sellers have accumulated stocks of engravings and etchings and as they may not come down in price, they therefore give photogravures and photographs the cold shoulder. A print seller who would confine himself to the sale and publication of photo-etchings and photographs is sorely needed.

Such, briefly, are the effects of photography on her sister arts and of them on her.