Camera Work: A Photographic Quarterly (1907 (Heft 17))

attend an exhibition and find that worse things than his rejected ones have
been hung; I fear that this year this must be the case in many instances.
But to come to particulars. Mr. Cadby (England) has four of his
delightful child-studies; none seem to me quite so intimately happy as
usual, and all would have gained by being seen separately, and not en bloc,
as now. His “Snow Sketch,” though clever to distraction, is not nearly as
good as an earlier effort in the same genre I can recall; there is here no
sense of cold or snow, only of blank paper with a few clever lines on it, ex-
cellently placed and spaced lines, to be sure, but not really winter suggesting.
Mrs. Cadby’s(England) “ Honesty ” fails in one way only; the spray is
beautifully placed, but the texture of the paper shows too plainly through
the seed-vessels, and tends to destroy their surface-charm and truth; their
exquisite translucence is not fully suggested or given. The most satisfying
collection in the gallery is that by Demachy (France). So good and so
various is the work that it suffers no whit in being hung together. One feels
at once in the presence of the trained and accomplished artist; one who has
really learned his business; it is not the mere ’prentice-hand that is here
evident. One does not need to accept or apologize for the work as merely
relatively good, relative, that is, to the limitations of the tools, or the material,
or the craftsman in the making. These things are positively, not relatively,
good; the painter's, the picture-qualities, are instant in their effect on one,
while the working out, the value of tone against tone, is so accomplished, so
sincere and successful, as to make one both envious and emulous.
Craig Annan (Scotland), in his “ Stirling Castle,” and “ Lady in a Silk
Gown,” is as distinguished as ever, though I can not quite accept the truth
of his sky over the castle; such a brightly-lit, cumulous cloud could hardly
have such a genuine early-evening effect on the foreground and middle dis-
tance. His “Thames at Hampton” is a delightfully soft and rich rendering
of water, wet and deep, and full of true surface treatment. Mr. M.
Arbuthnot (England) has some “gums,” most of the sort that make one
wish this aggravating but incomparable process had never been invented,
such a misleading method is it in inefficiently-trained hands or eyes. The
“ Road to the Farm” in especial seems to me to be full of the worst faults
of “gum”—granular surface, absence of planes, of tone-values, or of any
real sense of textures. “ After Rain ” is better, so much so, as to make one
wonder how the same man can accept both, though even this is not really
worthful when one knows what the best gum-work may be. George Davison’s
(England) “ The Mitre, Hampton Court,” has a very pleasant effect on the
wall, but it is hung too high for full enjoyment; here, indeed, is a definitely
bad piece of hanging, for the gum under it, “Across the Sandhills, Harech,”
would have gained by being hung as high as possible, though, personally, I
don't want it hung at all, it seems so lacking in truth to either subject or light,
and is so disagreeably granular, and so barren of anything like space, aërial
charm, or beauty of color. It must have some special attraction and meaning
to its conscientious and experienced maker, but I fail to share it; it is the
kind of “ gum ” that makes me bristle with opposition. W. Bennington’s

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