Camera Work: A Photographic Quarterly (1906 (Heft 16))

THE PHOTO-SECESSION EXHIBITION AT THE
PENNSYLVANIA ACADEMY OF FINE ARTS —
ITS PLACE AND SIGNIFICANCE IN THE
PROGRESS OF PICTORIAL PHOTOGRAPHY.
ONLY after the smoke of battle has cleared away and the
din and clamor of conflict have trembled into silence
can adequate idea be gathered of real results. 'Tis then
that forces, readjusting themselves to the requirements
of conditions, seek to attain the logic of their purpose, along lines of least
resistance.
Chaos evolving into inevitable order and law, often gropes blindly
before reaching the right path. Too often through sheer ignorance, it
involves itself in unnecessary travail and defeat—like the ant that must climb
over rather than go around the obstacles in its path.
Responding to impelling instinct it must go forward—whither, it
does not know.
Such, invariably, is the character of popular progress. Instinct compels
advance; fear, born of ignorance, holds it back. And, of all retarding
forces, fear of ridicule is the most powerful. With the majority, ridicule is
more persuasive than the force of logic or canon. And ’tis well so , for,
while ridicule has often killed what was of rare but fragile beauty and
promise, it has been the Spartan test of the virile, of what is timely, well-
balanced, and possessed of the robustness of Life. What it has not killed
it has strengthened, developing the latent force, by pruning what sapped the
strength. Often those who ridicule most bitterly are at heart in sympathy
with those they ridicule, and are eventually to be found in their ranks. They
are impelled to ridicule because they honestly fail to understand; or regarding
the cause attacked lightly or without thought, because they would win
reputation by ridiculing recognized persons or standards. At conflict with
those who hold back are those who strive forward to some definite end, too
full of the enthusiasm of conviction and of the correctness and desirability
of their purpose to fear the force of ridicule. Them it but tempers, trains,
and makes clearer of vision; teaches and corrects their weakness without
weakening their strength of purpose; strengthens the lights, and supplies the
shadows necessary to show by very contrast the brightness of Light. It is
the shades and shadows that go to making the picture. Without them all
would be monotony. Lacking the aid of the one, the other could not be
made apparent. So, without ridicule and opposition, there would be no
contest. Without contest, no progress.
The movement for the recognition of photography as a means of
original pictorial expression has been not lacking of conflict, of opposition,
of ridicule and misrepresentation, of Lights and Shadows. As so often
happens, many of those engaged in the conflict had the same end in view.
Others, fearing radical change, that would materially affect their professional
standing, with the success of the movement, opposed its progress with the

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