Camera Work: A Photographic Quarterly (1909 (Heft 26))

PHOTOGRAPHY, A MEDIUM OF EXPRESSION
As an illustrator and portrait photographer, Miss Alice Boughton, has achieved a
prominent place in American photography. Six of the illustrations in this number of
CAMERA Work are devoted to her photographs. To more fully understand Miss
Boughton’s particular point of view we reprint an article she wrote for “ The Scrip,” Dec-
ember, 1905. This article in parts conflicts with some of our own views on photography,
but we wish to reiterate for the nth time that articles published in the magazine do not
necessarily reflect our own views. As a matter of fact but few of them do. It has been
our policy—and it will continue to be our policy—to print such articles as we deem timely,
interesting or provocative of discussion.—Editors.
THE highest praise—supposedly praise—which is ever applied
to a print, is, that it does not look like a photograph, meaning
the ordinary, hard, retouched reproduction, which people in
general are accustomed to see. It is this latter thing, which
the public have had so long as an ideal, which gives rise to
such a remark.
The modern movement started among the amateurs, not among the
photographers. The amateurs wanted to have a little fun, to express them-
selves. Not being of the profession, they went at it with a free hand, unham-
pered by tradition. The cheapness of the camera allowed the many to indulge.
Also, the more ambitious wished to experiment with different kinds of papers,
from the ordinary silver print, to sepia and water-color. As these became
more interested, there appeared in the field new workers of intelligence and
imagination, who gradually acquired understanding of the medium. Having
something to say, they tried to say it. If they did not always succeed, still
they worked on, undisturbed by the jeers and gibes of the professional and his
accepted, academic point of view. At the present moment, it is the professional
who no longer scoffs, but tries to keep up and be in, what he thinks is the
fashion, not really comprehending how and why it has come about.
The so-called “new school” has this to guard against, a sacrifice of idea
to technique, pure and simple, so that one becomes conscious of an effort to
disguise, rather than use the camera. We hear much of a photograph, “like
a Rembrandt, ” “ a Holbein,” “ a Whistler, ” and so on. This is simply the imi-
tative instinct rather than the creative; but as the latter is the rarest gift in any
art, one may be tolerant of that phase, even though it does not satisfy deeper
desires. The conception is of primary importance, while technique, ability
to handle the tools, is, not only not to be despised, but absolutely necessary.
To have their productions not in the least resemble a photograph, seems to be
the goal of some of the new workers, but this attitude is both forced and false.
Why not avowedly use the camera ? Why be ashamed, because it is not some-
thing else ? It is partly this bias of mind, and partly the pleasure derived from
mere cleverness, which has swung the pendulum too far in the direction of
the non-academic, which, in its turn becomes just as unspontaneous and formal.
Why strain after effects, which are ultra-forced and not quite sincere, when so
much can be done simply and directly ? Much discussion has arisen as to
whether photography is a fine art, many declaring that it is. This claims

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