Camera Work: A Photographic Quarterly (1914 (Heft 47))

Whether it was the discouragement that follows achievement, or a
desire to cling to success and permanently establish its value, or merely a
consequent inertia caused by the absence of new or vital creative forces I
am not prepared to discuss here—but “291” was not actively a living issue.
I also fail to see any reason other than one or all of those enumerated above
that explains to me the attitude leading to the publishing of this Number
of Camera Work, unless it is simply the result of 29FS finding itself with
nothing better to do.
Again arrives the unforeseen—came the War.
If ever there came, within our time, a psychological element of universal
consequence that could rouse individuals out of themselves as individuals
and grip humanity at its very entrails, surely it was this one.
“291” continued the process of producing a book about itself,—
and calmly continued its state of marking time. As “291” it had failed
for once, and on this, an occasion of the greatest necessity, to realize its
relationship to the great unforeseen. It failed, as every human institution
failed, demoralized by the immensity of the event and blinded by the im-
mediate discussion of it, instead of instantly grasping the significance of
the great responsibility that was suddenly ours. It failed to grasp the neces-
sity of making of itself a vast force instead of a local one. Furthermore by
this failure is still left many individuals outside of its immediate circle
riding about with the solemn conviction that “291” was merely a “rival
to the old Camera Club” or “Mr. Stieglitz’s Gallery for the newest in art.”
By doing the convincing things conviction is carried and results achieved
that can never be accomplished by simply explaining them.
In this our endeavor to find wherein lies our best effort and to register
its appreciation let us be intelligent enough, then strong enough to recognize
our failure and write them both upon the same page.
Eduard J. Steichen

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