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THE PHOTOGRAPHIC NEWS. EDITED BY T- C- HEPWORTH, F.C.S, Vol. XXXV. No. 1706.—May 15, 1891. CONTENTS. PAGE A Photographer Amongst Impressionist Pictures. By George Davison 361 Photography in Austria 363 Colour. By W. E. Debenham 364 Art in Relation to Photography 3G5 Dr. J. M. Eder’s Critical Examination of Schiendl’s “History of Photography.” By C. Schiendl 366 International Photographic Exhibition at Vienna 367 Notes 368 Photography in France. By Leon Vidal 369 PAGE A Cheap Still 370 Report of the Committee on Standards 370 Messrs. Morgan and Kidd’s Works, Richmond 371 Mr. Pennell’s Answer to the Discussion on " Photography as a Hindrance and a Help to Art.” 372’ Patent Intelligence 373 Correspondence.—“ Curious People ”—The Quagga—The Ether Light - 374 Proceedings of Societies 374 Answers to Correspondents 376 A PHOTOGRAPHER AMONGST IMPRESSIONIST PICTURES. BY GEORGE DAVISON. Of the several exhibitions now running, the one which photographers will perhaps do best to visit is that being held by the New English Art Club at the Dudley Gallery. The result of a first and superficial examina tion upon a visitor new to the work of these painters may be to provoke a smile of superiority. The gallery going public, steeped in the pervading influence of the orthodox exhibitions, loses a true sense of the way many things really look. Long experience of conven tional treatment as to point of view, colour, and subject, seems to destroy our power of seeing anything else as natural. Photographers know that something of this kind is true of the movements of animals. The public estimate of what is a correct representation of the gallop of a horse is formed from the average of the great mass of published illustrations drawn by artists. These are, perhaps, not the best artists, and we may learn to see differently from closer observation, from the facts seized and shown us by the more observant ones, or from judiciously selected photographs. The same observation holds good of other matters, such as facts of colour, light, subject, and point of view. Any development that breaks out of a slavish groove, and that opens our eyes to see common things in a new and true way, makes for freedom and livelier pleasure, the joy of the discoverer. Some of the pictures at the Dudley Gallery, on full acquaintance and study, do this in a very charming way. Eccentricity for eccen tricity’s sake will always provoke ridicule, but that which we think eccentricity may be our own ignorance or conventionality. The Philistine visitor to the New English Art Club Exhibition does not stop long enough to understand his men and their work. They have worked from knowledge, and some of them have much to teach. A stranger who careers round the gallery to quiz frames, colour, subject, and methods superficially, will, no doubt, have, above everything, a feeling of whimsicalities ; but the unbiassed observer who cares I to stop long enough to know the pictures will find his estimate change. The Exhibition grows upon the mind in a very noticeable way. The colour which, at first, seemed crude gains naturalness, and figures that struck the sense as wooden reveal some fresh and beautiful fact on better acquaintance. Most of these men seem to have had something new to say, and they give it in the most direct method. Perhaps, in giving one par ticular fact or phase, there is at times a disregard of other common actualities, but generally the artist’s meaning is worth finding out. Even where the genius of imitation, the power of subtle characterisation, is absent, the work is generally suggestive and useful. The mere working under comparatively unconventional principles has its influence in spreading those principles. Schools and coteries may be a mistake in art, but it is a way nature has of working, and more of the New English Art Club spirit is what is now wanted. Some of the pictures, such as Nos. 9,12, 13,1 confess I have not as yet understood, but doubtless the artists them selves knew their intention. They cannot be expected to speak down to uncultured sense. Some, again, would probably look better in other than the gallery light. Altogether, a thorough and an open-minded study of the collection will leave the visitor with a very different impression from that gained from a first and prejudiced observation. It is an interesting test, after becoming steeped in the spirit of the Dudley Gallery, to walk into a neighbouring gallery, where the work is of a more conventional type. There is a special feature in the Exhibition which makes me draw the attention of photographers to it. In the centre of the gallery a large portfolio of photo graphs of the actual paintings on the walls is placed open for inspection. The photographs appear to be in sepia platinotype, and are by Mr. Fred. Hollyer. Such an opportunity for comparison is of considerable value to the photographer. It helps him materially in understanding the qualities of the works on the walls, and probably removes some prejudices. The photo graphs are a lesson in translation of colour into tone. They show how imperfect colour may weaken a paint-
