Camera Work: A Photographic Quarterly (1907 (Heft 18))

MONSIEUR DEMACHY AND
ENGLISH PHOTOGRAPHIC ART.*


IT is always interesting to see ourselves as others see us,
especially when the observer is of another country and
with the reputation of M. Demachy. He is not only a
Frenchman of the French, but he has also an intimate
acquaintance with our country, our art, our language, and
our national character. Little apology is needed for the
translation of such an incisive and suggestive article, the
latest of many which he has contributed to the excellent
monthly periodical, the Revue de Photographie, published by the Photo
Club of Paris. There has been hardly a number of the Revue without an
illuminating article from his pen. When, therefore, he contributes a paper
on English art in photography, it touches us very nearly indeed—touches
us on the raw almost. Besides, we may look upon it as a challenge and a
profession of faith. If we, on this side of the water, are of a different faith,
so much the better, or so much the worse for us. Sarcastic, sometimes
almost bitter in expression, it conveys a word of warning which, coming from
such an observer, can not have been written without provocation. As he
puts it, the bacillus of disease is there, the temperaments of certain workers
are favorable to its reception and cultivation. One thing is certain: if it
be allowed to grow, the result will be a line of demarcation in pictorial
photography between this country and France which will tend, in the eyes
of the foreigner, to lower the standard which England raised fifteen years
ago. It is certain also that America, Germany, and Austria will be on the
French side of the frontier. Let us be honest. If photography is a mechan-
ical pursuit, its limits can be clearly defined; but if it has ambitions also in
the direction of art, it can not be run on lines which are fixed within such
limits. Artists have never admitted its pretensions to the higher qualities
while it suggests or implies only a mechanical operation, and they never will.
After all, however, M. Demachy should not take too seriously the vaporings
of certain critics. He is well read in our photographic literature—better
read than I, for I can not put my finger on the passages he cites. He should
remember, too, that it is sometimes necessary to write down to your public.
A humiliating necessity, but modern journalism is not a philanthropic insti-
tution. Very telling indeed and bravely said, perhaps for the first time, is
the concluding paragraph but one of this article: “The photographic charac-
ter”—that is, a photograph which is nothing more than a photograph— is“,
and has always been, an anti-artistic character.” It is more than anti-artistic,
on account of its pretentiousness, and unless we eliminate it we can never
hope to approach true art nearer than the pianola approaches in music the
soul of the musician and the touch of the human finger. Qua art, a pure
photograph is but pianola art, at the best. So it is that I confess I should
like to see an exhibition or salon where nothing should be admitted that has
*Reprinted from the Amateur Photographer, with special permission of Mr. A. Horsley Hinton, its editor.

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