Camera Work: A Photographic Quarterly (1906 (Heft 14))

In the Photograms of 1905 (London), A. C. R. Carter, the art-critic, in
reviewing the London Salon, says:
" ... As in 1904, the display is a great opportunity for Eduard Steichen, who is
clearly the head and front of photography’s offending in its invasion of the field of art. Such a
masterpiece of insight and arrangement as the Rodin portrait, instead of being the last word in
photographic advance seems rather to me a first trumpet-note in a new world of progress. Another
American, Alvin Langdon Coburn, has made a big spring forward, and Clarence White, too, is
much better represented than for some time past.
Whether the word went forth that this year native products would have a short shrift I can not
say, but it is obvious that the English section, apart from its reduced number, does not contain a
large leaven of greatly improved or inspired work. There is plenty of accomplished and attractive
work, yet one looks in vain for some one who has taken his courage in both hands and broken a lance
with the Americans. . . . Once again I have to bear witness to the dominating force of
Eduard Steichen’s art. Confronted with his achievements, neither the protagonist nor the detractor
of photography can say his last word on the subject. The first feels that a worker has arisen who
at last can continue from strength to strength, and that therefore he can not foretell to what pitch
he may advance photography. As for the hostile critic, I defy him to come out of his windowless
entrenchments and formulate any new attack that has a shadow of logic in it. It matters not to me
what art Steichen’s examples do or do not resemble. They must be judged by what they are and
what they convey. If a man tells me that he can not see the sunlight in the Mother and Child
or in Springy then he must swear to me that he is blind, otherwise his portion should be in outer
darkness forevermore. But I have done with him and his kind. I wish to enjoy my own thoughts,
and I shall remember for many a day the rich depth and strength of the velvet tones in the Poster
Lady, the tearful vision of Duse, and that masterpiece of portraiture, Rodin, set before his own
masterpiece, “Le Penseur,” inspired and inspirative — with the ghost of the Victor Hugo looking
on. I am tired of that addled question in the short catechism of the camera : “ Is photography
an art?” with all its bungling answers in extenso. Let the answer be: “Yes : It is Steichen.
Enough said!” And some day doubtless another man will spring forth and be to Steichen as
Steichen is to Stieglitz. The services rendered to the cause by Alfred Stieglitz must not be forgotten,
for it was his pioneership which cleared the tangled ground and made a Steichen possible. No.
120, for example, shows the genesis of Steichen’s Spring theme, and again the Stieglitz who saw
the sunny air in Going to the Post paved the way for Alvin Coburn to arrive at his sunlit bridge.