Wallpapers And Hangings

We do not know whether or not photography has bean applied to the manufacture of either of these materials, but there is wide scope for it. It must be remembered, however, that definite patterns are obtrusive and undesirable. A rather monotonous geometrical pattern is required, the suggestion, however, coming from nature. Thus a good pattern could be obtained from a transverse section of a rose-bud, or from various seed-cases, such as those of the convolvulus and rose. Histological specimens also, and desmids and diatoms, all suggest beautiful and varied forms of geometrical patterns. This has often occurred to us when examining the wonderfully varied and beautiful forms of the diatom family. It would, it seems to us, be very easy with multiplying backs to get large numbers of a form on one plate, and then to reproduce them by cheap photo-mechanical means, and though we have never yet heard of photographic wall-papers, yet there is no reason why they should not be manufactured, if made artistically.

D'Oyleys

For hangings these same patterns might be woven in or even printed directly upon the materials, by the platino-type process. The company who brought forward that process keep prepared nainsook, why not other materials? For small things, such as d'Oyleys, an endless and pleasing variety might be introduced.

In short, photography can and should be made amenable to the principles of decorative art, and employed legitimately in thousands of ways; but the student must never forget that he must rigidly and resolutely keep within the bounds of his art, which bounds we have briefly indicated here. Common sense, taste, and study are his best safe-guards. In all attempts, however, let him go to nature for his suggestions; she, if he be humble and patient, will not be less lavish to him than to the painter. So we find ourselves at the end of this chapter, and our considerations on photography as applied to decorative art lead us to conclude that the form in which it is at present chiefly applied, i.e. transparencies, is false in principle, and therefore undesirable. We felt this long before we studied art at all, and although we made many opals and transparencies at one time, we soon gave them up as vanity and foolishness. Those, however, who with training and artistic feeling care to explore the undeveloped fields above indicated, will be sure to find many new treasures.

L'Envoi. Photography - A Pictorial Art

"In such an age as this, painting should be understood, not looked on with blind wonder, nor considered only as poetic inspiration, but as a pursuit, legitimate, scientific, and mechanical."

John Constable.

The aim.

Rock Scratch-Ings. Outline Drawing

We wish from the first to make it clearly understood as to what is our object in comparing photography with the other pictorial arts. It is not to condemn any of the other arts as inadequate for artistic expression, for we hold that good art, as expressed even by a lead pencil, is better than bad art expressed on the largest of canvases, but our object is to inquire what position the technique of photography takes when regarded side by side with the methods and limits of each of the pictorial arts. The earliest pictorial expressions of the human mind were, as we all know, rude rock-scratchings in the form of outline. This outline drawing served the earliest nations, as it still serves children, to express in a conventional way certain limited truths, for the power of seeing and analyzing nature is of recent development, and is even now far from fully developed. Keeping this in mind, we must nevertheless not allow ourselves to despise these efforts of the undeveloped mind. Line drawing, it must be remembered, has nothing to do with tone. If you look at a line drawing of a figure by a great master, it suggests to you, in a certain limited way, the real thing, for the lines bound spaces, hence there is a suggestion of the solid figure. With almost any medium, even with pen, ink, and paper, an artist will often draw a subject in outline, to see "how it will come." Sculptors nearly always do this, but these men do not consider these outlines as finished works, but simply as an aid to their work, - mere brief sketches suggestive of what shall be. Of course, such notes when done by a great artist become invaluable, as suggesting great truth of impression. Yet there are men who seem to stop at this stage, and revel in "beauty of line," or else they elaborate these drawings until they pass beyond the legitimate limits of the art by which they are expressed.