Camera Work: A Photographic Quarterly (1910 (Heft 30))

as they are sent in to the editorial offices of photographic magazines, we now
and then will experience a novel impression. We do not remember of ever
having seen it done just that way, and yet the objects are well represented and
the general effect is a pleasing one. I have seen trees taken in moonlight that
were absolutely without composition and yet not entirely devoid of some
crude kind of pictorialism. It was produced by the light effect. Such a picture
cannot be simply put aside by the remark that we hear so frequently “That is
a bad composition.” It may be poor art but it is physically interesting.
Climatic and sociological conditions and the normal appreciation of the
appearances of contemporary life, will lead the camera workers unconsciously
to the most advantageous and characteristic way of seeing things. The innova-
tions which will become traditional will be transmitted again and again, until
some pictorialist will become the means of imposing the authority of the most
practical manner upon his successors. In this way all night photographers,
good or bad, will help to discover and invent a scheme or method that will be
suitable for the subject and consequently become universally applicable. And
so it will be with every branch of pictorialism, may it be in the domain of fore-
ground study, of moonlight photography, of animal or flower delineation, of
protraiture, figure arrangement or the nude.
The most important factors in these discoveries will be those qualities
that are most characteristic of photography as a medium of expression. The
facility of producing detail and the differentiation of textures, the depth and
solid appearance of dark planes, the ease with which forms can be lost in
shadows, the production of lines solely by tonal gradations and the beautiful
suggestion of shimmering light, all these qualities must be accepted as the
fundamental elements of any new development. Photographic representation,
no doubt, will become addicted more and more to space composition, to the
balancing of different tonal planes and the reciprocal relation of spaces. This
may be an advantage from the point of physical optics. Beauty is chiefly
concerned with the muscular sweep of the eye in cognizing adjacent points.
It is generally conceded that the impression is more gratifying if these points
are limited to a few. Every spot requires a readjustment of the visual organs,
as we can only observe a very small space at a time. Too many spots, as may
occur in modern compositions, no doubt will prove wearisome and fatiguing, but
if the spotting is skillfully handled, it after all will represent the fundamental
principle of esthetic perception, and the sense of sight will adjust itself gradually
to the necessity of rapid changes.
Also the relationship of lines, so confused and intricate in scenes like a
railroad station or a machine shop, factory, derrick or skeleton structure of
a building, will need special consideration. The variety and the irregularity
of such lines, in which the straight and angular line will predominate, may be
compared to the unresolved discords, unrelated harmonies, little wriggling
runs and all the external characteristics of the modern French composers.
Debussy mastered these apparently incongruous elements sufficiently well
to construct novel combinations of sound that, after all, are pleasing to the ear.
If new laws are really to be discovered, an acquaintance with the various
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