Pictorial Photographers of America

“ By John Paul Edwards The progress of pictorial photography in the Far West can be aptly compared with the settlement and growth of this big new country itself. We have had our pictorial pioneers, as it were—our hard-working, enthusiastic, rather crude first settlers in the art; now we have come to the stage of permanent abode, with traditions, albeit young, great enthusiasm, definite ideals, and ambitious hopes for the future.
The one great asset in the upbuilding of the West has been boundless enthusiasm. ”

“ Is the medium the secret? Will one paper or developer produce soot and whitewash effects and another a picture? Are soft effects generally produced by manipulation in developing negatives or prints?”
“I believe the quality of a picture is not due to the medium by which it was made. It depends entirely on the man who made it. I think one man can make a good print on soft paper and another a good print on hard paper. I do not think the medium makes the picture. I think the medium produces the picture to some extent, but it does not make the picture.” ”

“ The problem must be left to each individual. The beauty of a bromoil print, for instance, is supreme to its devotee: is its superiority to other processes worth the time and the toil necessary to make it, which might be devoted to the study of composition, of a wider range of subject, or to the mastery of simpler processes? Picture construction and print quality are after all the main things in photography, not the medium we use.
There is no royal road to distinction in photography, but each year sees some helps devised for the earnest worker, whether amateur or professional. ”

“ For one reason or another the men whose names were known ten or fifteen years ago seem to have dropped out and their places are being filled by new blood, men with high ideals and aspirations, who are not content merely with reproducing, by means of their cameras, pretty scenes and places, but who believe that photography is capable of much more—of showing not only the physical facts, but the very spirit of nature herself—a true impressionism ”

“ But orderly thought, patience and fine craftsmanship in carrying out your idea frequently count for more than the originality or brilliance of the idea itself. Owing to the restlessness of the world situation—wars and rumors of wars, strikes and overtendency towards jazz and slang—there is already, especially in the work of youngsters, too evident an urge to be different; different merely for the sake of being different.
A thought possibly worthy of the deliberation of every artist is that Distinction is a result, never the object, of a great mind. ”

“ In the world at large, pictorial photography has grown amazingly. This has led to a more pronounced line of demarkation between the dilettante and the intelligent worker of appreciation, with the balance of influence inclining strongly to the latter. In Maryland there has been an upheaval, a photographic revolution, so to speak, and out of the wreckage has sprung the Photographic Guild of Baltimore, which has done more to put Maryland photographically to the fore in its five years of activity than had been done in all the years previous. ”

“ The amateur photographer, however, finds his expenses heavy and the temptation strong to sell his pictures; while in America the professional photographer is frequently so much in love with the pictorial possibilities of his work that he loses sight of the financial end of it.
For the worker to get the real enthusiasm and benefit from photography, the thing now necessary to mark a distinct note of progress, or to make an outstanding year, is to have a great international exhibition, similar to the one held in Buffalo in 1910. ”

“ My usual method of enlarging from small camera shots is this. I enlarge a transparency (positive) up to 61⁄2×81⁄2 or 8×10. “In an Italian Village” was an 8×10 positive, sharp lens. Then, either with a soft focus or a sharp focus lens, I enlarge to whatever size I want and whatever effect I'm after. The advantage of enlarging the positive is that you can do any faking you want to better advantage, and when your enlarged negative is done you can print in any medium you wish, so I always make enlarged negatives. I don't think I've made a bromide enlargement in twenty years. ”

“ Its position is unique, since the worker is afforded not only an opportunity to exhibit his pictures in various museums and art galleries, but is made to feel that maintaining photographic standards and studying the arts for breadth of view are of chief importance.
Some of the advantages which photography offers are worth restating. It helps to draw one closer to nature and to seek fresh air. Through the exercise and cultivation of choice, it teaches how to decorate the home, to dress with taste, and to keep an alert eye and mind on the passing events of the world. ”

“ I sometimes feel that an anastigmat lens is best and sometimes that a soft focus lens is best for some particular work, and sometimes I feel that if I could get only one I would prefer an anastigmat to a soft focus. ”

“ Men of ideas have brains that function exactly as those of other normal well-ordered citizens. They are not gifted by strange kinks in their brain cells. When the prominent cartoonist is contemplating the banal act of shaving or putting in a new furnace, his thoughts are no more or less exalted or lofty than when creating a cartoon idea intended to sway public opinion. ”

“ Because the Association knows that photography is able to teach these things, it sought the aid of art museums and public libraries to conduct photographic exhibitions so that children and adults may not only see fine examples of the work of the camera in the hands of artists, but be led thereby to appreciate more fully the value of photography as an aid to interesting composition and a quickening of the eye in realizing the beauty of sunlight and shadows which flit around us much unrecognized at times. ”

“ Do you recommend one of the new high-priced enlarging cameras, which focus the lens automatically on any size of paper, as suitable for clubs to purchase?”
“Well, I must confess that I have only heard of it, and the price seems to be such as to discourage almost all the pictorial workers that I know. In my observation of the work that has been done by pictorialists, the very fact that in many instances they use makeshift apparatus has resulted in some of the most beautiful effects in their work. Good apparatus is of course desirable, but there are happy accidents with the other sort. ”

“ He who reverently observes life and wrests from its verities those elements which are in tune with his “ego”—transposes these into some concrete form without the damning desire for self aggrandizement, pretense, or mere seeking for originality—is building on good foundations. It is from an over-weening desire for originality that most of the affectations of so called “Modern Art” proceed.
Natural individuality—the sincere personal vision of the artist—is an inherited asset. ”

“ Exhibitions in many museums which have hitherto been indifferent to pictures made with the lens have opened the eyes of the public to the possibilities of the camera. Clubs of photographic workers in various cities have maintained or fostered the movement. The lure of the moving picture has stimulated the interest of countless multitudes in photography, and the occasional presentation of fine pictorial work in this direction has given a prophecy of better things to come. ”

“ Confining our attention to American exhibitions, I would remark that instead of, as in former years, having one big exhibition in Baltimore or Philadelphia or some other city, there are now active centers all over the country—there is a regularly established international salon in Los Angeles, and the well-known Pittsburgh Salon, and regularly established exhibitions in Portland and Toronto. There are groups of enthusiastic workers in all these centers. There are also exhibitions of photographic art regularly held in many of the museums of the country. ”

“ Without losing a whit of the steady enthusiasm which has brought it to its present encouraging stage, Western pictorial photography is, nevertheless, settling down to a more staid and intellectual plane of progress.
The broad average of quality of work is steadily improving. Better standards have been established. The workers are “finding” themselves. Enthusiasm is being beneficently tempered by increased technical skill, and more particularly by the intellectual development of the art side of the work. ”

“ Alcock's picture was made under similar conditions.
Picturing New York with a camera after dark is perhaps one of the most interesting phases of pictorial photography. After spending several evenings prowling about for subjects that will lend themselves for night pictures you start out one evening to transfer these mental images to the plate. A little patience, endurance, and a great deal of enthusiasm will do wonders. It is not the easiest thing in the world to start out with an 8×10 view camera, a good substantial tripod, and several plate-holders. ”

“ Every healthy-minded youngster born, has two early ambitions: one to be a great baseball player, another to become President. And yet the scouts and managers for the Big Leagues have difficulty in discovering talent above the average.
In the field of Pictorial Photography, the average is exceedingly high. This volume is a demonstration. To be sure, if one seeks, one can quickly discover atrocities in the galleries and on the printed page; but my conviction is that the progress from the purely aesthetic standpoint has kept pace with the mechanical and scientific strides made in Photography. ”

“ President of the Pictorial Photographers of America To many people photography is merely a mechanical process. To an increasing number, however, photography is being seen as an art, by which personal impressions of nature or human life may be expressed as truly as by the brush. These workers in photography see in it a medium by which the action of light upon sensitive surfaces may be so controlled as really to interpret scenes and persons in the individualistic spirit of a true art. From every part of our country come evidences of the growing appreciation of photography as a pictorial medium. ”

“ By Henry Hoyt Moore We cannot claim for our art any outstanding phenomenon like the interest in the radio that has swept the country this year, or any remarkable development in the science of photography like the invention a few years ago of the Lumière plate. ”

“ And the Graflex is not so very heavy when a film pack or cut films are used. The image is always right side up and you see it in the full size. No one can question the efficiency of the shutter, and with practice you can hold the camera for a one-fifth second exposure. The only drawback to the outfit is in seeing things from the waist level, which makes the foreground difficult. Thinking of your picture as a pattern, however, it is better to be looking down from an elevation and with a nine-inch lens on a 4×5 box the immediate foreground is negligible. ”

“ It is this live energy and enthusiasm which brings him out afield even before break of day, which leads him over hill and dale, mountain and valley, in his insatiable quest for the pictorial. Miles are as nothing; hunger stays him not ”

“ But in that fact there is no cause for discouragement to the novice, for new names are to be found in the catalogues of all the exhibitions, and there is no league to keep out any individual's pictures anywhere. That is one of the triumphs of our art—that, while judges may sometimes err and exclude a good picture or select a poor one, there is a general open-mindedness in recognizing merit wherever it exists. ”

“ You are too conscious of the soft focus lens and of the anastigmatic lens. That is, one part of the picture is made with a soft focus lens and one with an anastigmatic. I believe that the soft focus lens can be used, and will be used, in such a way as to give beautiful results on the screen.”
Is Photography to Remain a Black and White Art? “What forecast, Mr.White, do you make of future developments in photography? Is it to remain a black and white art, or are photographs in natural colors to supersede the familiar photograph of the present day in our exhibitions and in our homes?” ”

“ The purpose of this preliminary psychologic analysis is to explain the militant attitude of the Western pictorialist in his pursuit of the art of the camera. His extremely prolific production, manifesting itself in liberal contributions to the salons and exhibitions of the world photographic, rises not from vanity but from super-enthusiasm—from the great joy he derives in making his picture, from the creation of the beautiful, and from the playing of the game as it is best played. ”

“ The Pictorial Photographers, besides holding their general meetings in one of the larger rooms and sharing the lounge for social purposes, have now their own room (with attendance) which, accessible day and evening, will be a meeting place for our members, resident and non-resident, and a center from which we may get into touch with one another; a place for the continuous exhibition of prints upon the walls and in portfolios, where art lovers, buyers and advertisers can see and, if they wish, arrange to buy our work or come into communication with our workers ”

“ Hand Work vs. Straight Prints “What are the limits of hand work that are legitimate in photography? I don't like to use the word faking, but most people would so describe it. I mean, for instance, putting in skies, blocking out obtrusive backgrounds, sunning down high lights, retouching negatives, printing through prepared masks that entirely alter the negative, and pencil or air brush work on prints?” ”

“ After all, the making of pictures with a camera is to a large extent a matter of education and training—not so much in the way of overcoming the technical difficulties of the medium, though of course this must be learned too, but in such vital matters as composition, choice of subject matter, unity, simplicity, and the like. ”

“ Struggling young artists are constantly advised to cultivate their imagination. What is imagination? Arthur Brisbane defined this in the most compact, tangible statement: “Imagination is nothing more than the power to see and realize what others fail to see and realize.” The illusive idea that we are searching for is nothing hidden or mystic but right before our very eyes. ”

“ Softness Desirable, Not Fuzziness “Is there a tendency, as shown in the work seen in the magazines, the exhibitions, and the photographs selected for the present Annual, to get rid of fuzziness and substitute a rational degree of softness and atmospheric effect?”
“I would say that the reproductions that we see in the magazines do not in all cases represent lens work but, I fear, bad printing sometimes. There is often a good definite quality in soft focus lens work that looks very definite indeed, even more definite than a sharp lens will give. Fuzziness is bad, but not softness. ”