DOI article:
Holland, Clive: Some notes upon the Pictorial School and its leaders in France
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.27086#0104
FRANCE
Mmcs. Binder-Mestro, Huguet, Chas. de Lassence, Miles. C.
Laguarde, Antoinette Bucquet, and A. M. Massion, MM. Robt.
Demachy, Rene le Begue, Pierre Dubreuil, Ch. Sollet, Maurice
Bucquet, Georges Grimprel, A. Gerber, Albert Gilibert, Gaston
Lecreux, Paul Bourgeois, Major C. Puyo, Commandant E. Bourgeois,
the Comte C. de Clugny, and Gaston Roux, to mention only a few
whose pictures of recent years have not only attracted attention from
artists, but have shown some distinct originality, and are generally
gifted with sentiment and pictorial feeling.
Few French pictorialists are better known both in England and the
United States than M. Robert Demachy, who ten years or so ago
was in the forefront of the movement towards artistic photography,
and who still remains one of its ablest exponents. One distinguish-
ing feature of M. Demachy’s work is its catholicity of subject. He
has essayed figure studies, portraiture, landscape, marine, decorative
work and other minor branches of photographic art with almost
unfailing success, a result which is probably as much traceable to
his great command of the media in which he works, whether
platinum, carbon, or “ gum,” as to his innate artistic perception.
M. Demachy has been an almost constant exhibitor during the last
ten years at the English Salon and other exhibitions, and
English pictorial workers have therefore been able to follow his
career with a closeness which has not been possible in the case of
some of his confreres, and to become acquainted thereby with much
of what is best and most artistic in French pictorial work.
M. Demachy has often been singularly fortunate in his models, and
the evident sympathy which has existed between them and himself
has served to bring about that unstudied and spontaneous result
which is so marked a feature in most of the French pictorial work
in the genre of portraiture and figure studies. Although be it here
said that in the former class France at present possesses no workers
who can be placed upon an equal footing with Messrs. Craig Annan,
F. Hollyer, Reginald Craigie, or F. H. Evans.
In the earlier exhibitions of the Photographic Salon (English)
M. Demachy was represented by work in most classes, and created
little less than astonishment amongst English workers, who, though
accustomed to pictures of several genres from one worker, were
not used to such distinction as was shown by M. Demachy in
so many fields of photographic expression.
The same tale of fertility and variety might be told of most of
his work of succeeding years. In more recent times he has
produced some most excellent landscapes, several good examples
f 4
Mmcs. Binder-Mestro, Huguet, Chas. de Lassence, Miles. C.
Laguarde, Antoinette Bucquet, and A. M. Massion, MM. Robt.
Demachy, Rene le Begue, Pierre Dubreuil, Ch. Sollet, Maurice
Bucquet, Georges Grimprel, A. Gerber, Albert Gilibert, Gaston
Lecreux, Paul Bourgeois, Major C. Puyo, Commandant E. Bourgeois,
the Comte C. de Clugny, and Gaston Roux, to mention only a few
whose pictures of recent years have not only attracted attention from
artists, but have shown some distinct originality, and are generally
gifted with sentiment and pictorial feeling.
Few French pictorialists are better known both in England and the
United States than M. Robert Demachy, who ten years or so ago
was in the forefront of the movement towards artistic photography,
and who still remains one of its ablest exponents. One distinguish-
ing feature of M. Demachy’s work is its catholicity of subject. He
has essayed figure studies, portraiture, landscape, marine, decorative
work and other minor branches of photographic art with almost
unfailing success, a result which is probably as much traceable to
his great command of the media in which he works, whether
platinum, carbon, or “ gum,” as to his innate artistic perception.
M. Demachy has been an almost constant exhibitor during the last
ten years at the English Salon and other exhibitions, and
English pictorial workers have therefore been able to follow his
career with a closeness which has not been possible in the case of
some of his confreres, and to become acquainted thereby with much
of what is best and most artistic in French pictorial work.
M. Demachy has often been singularly fortunate in his models, and
the evident sympathy which has existed between them and himself
has served to bring about that unstudied and spontaneous result
which is so marked a feature in most of the French pictorial work
in the genre of portraiture and figure studies. Although be it here
said that in the former class France at present possesses no workers
who can be placed upon an equal footing with Messrs. Craig Annan,
F. Hollyer, Reginald Craigie, or F. H. Evans.
In the earlier exhibitions of the Photographic Salon (English)
M. Demachy was represented by work in most classes, and created
little less than astonishment amongst English workers, who, though
accustomed to pictures of several genres from one worker, were
not used to such distinction as was shown by M. Demachy in
so many fields of photographic expression.
The same tale of fertility and variety might be told of most of
his work of succeeding years. In more recent times he has
produced some most excellent landscapes, several good examples
f 4