Page 28 - Studio International - July August 1975

two photographs illustrated here are distract attention from the face, it is duly as regards technique, and, in the
reproductions of two gum prints by subservient, and indeed only helps and application of albumenized paper,
Demachy, both dating from 1906, and directs the attention to it, and forces one warmer and more varied tone-
both taken from the same negative. The to realize how searchingly and beautifully colourings strongly assert themselves.
superficial similarity of brush it is treated. Note, too, how rightly put on Before long comes the period of
development on the gum prints to the the paper it all is; how well balanced; and decadence, and the hideous glossy paper
brushwork of portrait paintings is how curiously well felt is the shoulder for some time holds undisputed sway,
immediately obvious. Demachy has mass and line of chest, all helped into until the platinum printing process
clearly been intent on letting his work on recognition by the fine foil of the black coming into vogue, brings us still nearer
the prints remain evident — notice the mass of the hat. It is surely a study any the arts of engraving and etching. For
scraping marks around the wide-brimmed artist in any method might be satisfied here the photographer, having already
hat on the darker print. Demachy with'. appropriated the tones and effects of
protested that he was not able to draw or But not all defenders of 'pure chalk and crayon, now annexes the
paint and so could not add new material photography' were prepared to accept special medium of the artists, and we
to his prints — something which, he said, these startling prints which often bore make our platinum prints on Dutch, on
he would not do in any case. There is a a striking resemblance to paintings, to Whatman, on Joynson, or on Lalanne
similarity to be drawn between other types of prints, or to drawings in paper. We are far indeed from the
Demachy's manipulated portrait prints pastel. In 1902 W. Smedley Aston, a metallic support of Daguerre.
and the work of the Victorian portrait conservative photographer, speaking at Meanwhile, carbon printing has followed
photographers who also were unable to the Royal Photographic Society, quoted the movement : it has stolen pigment
paint, but who produced 'painted William Morris's statement that: 'To from painting, and the sensitive metallic
photographs' on demand. In the work attempt to make stone look like iron, or salt disappears to give place to lamp black,
of both, the areas which demanded the wood like silk, or pottery like stone, is the and brown and red ochres, indelibly
most subtlety of tone and modelling — the last resource of decrepitude in Art'. He fixed by light on the same papers that are
face and hands — were left largely went on to say that this could be applied used by Whistler or by Helleu — with how
untouched. However, Demachy was able with special aptness to photography: 'To great a difference, alas ! Then, at last, the
to handle tonal modification with great make a photograph look like an etching, a gum process is revived, its pigments are
skill, and the highlight on the right wash drawing, a mezzotint, and to go the those of water-colour paintings, as in
eyelid of the girl in the lighter print makes length of framing it as such, to back up a carbon printing; but the shiny gelatine
her seem drowsy when compared with transparency with gold paper or silk has disappeared, the medium is purer,
the other print, which shows a poised, gauze, proclaims, far more eloquently every kind of paper is at the
self-assured young lady. than any arguments of mine, the purblind photographer's disposition, and the
It is surprising that Demachy's fatuist who, having eyes, sees not, and softness of the coating, the flow of the
manipulated gum prints were very much reveals a state of mind that is sadly gum colouring give to the print the
admired by Frederick H. Evans, the deficient in the conception of the fitness character common to all pictures formed
London photographer, who would have of things and of what is right and true, with like materials : the parentage
nothing to do with retouching his and is altogether at variance with the becomes more and more evident'.
own work or even cropping in his prints. principles which underlie all true art in Demachy stressed again the similarity
In 1903 he wrote an article in which he any shape or form'." of purpose between the photographer and
describes his reaction to yet another gum Demachy stoutly defended his workers in other media: 'the artist
print from the same negative which was position: 'Gum bichromate workers photographer in his study of nature is in
titled Portrait of Mdlle. C (sic) and was, have been accused of producing poor a precisely similar situation to that of the
to describe it very roughly, a cross imitations of wash drawings, engravings, lithographer, or the engraver, or of any
between the two prints shown here.21 etc. The prints may be poor, I readily other worker in black and white. Their
Evans wrote that 'it might possibly be acknowledge that, but they are certainly object is the same: to translate in an
thought by some that I ought, logically, not imitations, for they have not been original and personal manner. The
to condemn, or at least to find fault with made with the intention of being passed difference lies simply in the method of
[it] as being, or verging on the lines of, off for something else than photographs. execution. The more these methods are
the imitation that I recently inveighed That a photograph printed in water mingled one with another the more the
against, seeing the large amount of hand- colour pigment, and developed with resemblances of the final results will be
work visible in the Portrait . . . work, that water and sometimes with a brush, should accentuated. There is neither plagiarism
is, that cannot rightly be considered as partake of some of the characteristics of nor imitation, but only identity of
due to the camera and lens. But I shall monochrome water-colour painting is aspirations, submission to the same
not do so, as I find them perfectly quite natural.'" Demachy then principles of art, principles which are
legitimate examples of photographic art : developed this investigation of the common to all the arts, and, on these
the modelling of the face in this similarities between differing media in an accounts, there must be resemblances in
Portrait, for instance, is the only article titled 'Some Points of Contact in results.'"
essential part of the study, and is the Monochrome Arts'. He argued that These assertions are borne out by the
emphatically due to the skilled and photography should not be seen in astonishing similarities between the
artistic use of the lens, etc. Though a isolation from other methods of print- lithograph-like prints of Demachy and
perfectly used crayon might simulate it, making, and claimed that the history of the lithographs of Albert de Belleroche,
be fully as good in technical efficiency photographic processes revealed a with whom Demachy was in close
as this is, yet to me this conveys gradual appropriation by photography of contact in Paris during the nineties and
something beyond what any crayon the methods and materials of these older after. A typical Belleroche lithograph,
drawing would: that essential something, monochrome arts : 'To take the very entitled Reverie, is reproduced here. The
that dominant feeling of necessary truth starting point of photography, the subject-matter (a beautiful girl with arms
to subject that is inalienable from the silvered plate of Daguerre with its and shoulders bared), the setting (an ill-
proper and perfect use of the lens. One iridescent reflections in which the image defined interior space in which details
feels in the presence of a vital is only clearly visible at a certain angle. are subjugated in order to direct
presentment, a portrait study that is also We have here an entirely new graphic attention to the girl), and the means used
a true likeness; not a mere fanciful process resembling in no ways anything to create the desired effect (free but
characterization that is more or less like, which has gone before. Before long, controlled hand-work swirling around
and whose charm and value is due rather however, the nature of the supporting the much more carefully defined face,
to the handling than to the reality or material is changed, and with it changes hands and arms of the girl), all bear a
essential truth of the study. The sketchy the special aspect of the picture. The close resemblance to the work of
treatment of the drapery and accessories photographer has taken from the Demachy. 26
is apparently derivative from any draughtsman his paper, and immediately However, there were those who could
method but that of the lens and camera : he borrows from the etcher some of his not agree with Demachy's arguments
but it is quite legitimate in this case, effects. Next comes a wish for colour — concerning the natural links between the
because it is so rightly done. It does not influenced by an art, still more ancient, monochrome arts. George Bernard Shaw

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