PICTORIALISM: THE ORIGINS OF THE VISUAL ART GROUP by Andrew Leeming LRPS

January 2021 No. 8

Science, through advances, discovery and the development of new materials and equipment, has always gone hand-in-hand with creating new possibilities in art; indeed the raison d’être of the RPS commences with the words, “To promote the art and science of photography...” Innovation in one area stimulates progress in another, through a cross-fertilisation of ideas. In present times the art of photography has been changed by electronics, image sensors, software, LCD screens, computers, digital file formats, social media and the internet, all of which have contributed to taking pictures on excellent or miniaturised equipment, thus becoming more affordable and easier to achieve. Communicating the results to others takes a few seconds. In the Netherlands during the late 1300s, an understanding of the nature of oils created new possibilities for blending colour tones and paintings free of brush strokes. In Italy, lenses, mirrors and optical instruments promoted the techniques of painting to astonishing new heights of accomplishment from the early 1500s. From the late 1700s, Turner painted with the brilliant yellows, greens and blues created by the discovery of new chemical elements and pigments derived from them. From the 1850s, chemical dyes from coal tars gave the Pre-Raphaelites vibrant colours for their canvases. These dyes also made photography possible. The new “seeing” of photography spurred the Impressionists to paint in the moment, the impression, rather than labour for months in a studio. The works and perspectives of Edgar Degas – an orchestra pit, racehorses, an office in a cotton exchange – are framed exactly as they would be in a viewfinder.

Light-sensitive chemical compounds of silver and chlorine or iodine allowed the development of photography from the 1830s. Astronomer and polymath Sir William Herschel coined the terms “photography”, “negative” and “snapshot”, whilst suggesting the way to make a photographic emulsion permanent by “fixing” it with a solution of sodium thiosulphate. Continuing the theme of optics, equipment and photo-chemistry that stimulated developments in the arts: George Eastman revolutionised photography by turning it into an activity for everyone. He searched the world for a flexible plastic – polymer science, once again - for his innovation of emulsion-coated roll films to replace glass plate negatives. The introduction of the Kodak box camera in 1889 meant that photography was no longer the preserve of only the wealthy, academics or artists. “You press the button, we do the rest.”

The Kodak camera containing the finished film was posted to the Eastman laboratories; then the developed prints, together with the camera – loaded with a new film – were posted back. Prior to Eastman’s innovations in science and equipment, cameras used cumbersome glass plates to produce the negatives, firstly with a wet solution of the photographic emulsion, which had to be spread on the glass in a mobile darkroom just before exposure. Easier-to-handle pre-coated dry plates were sold from the 1870s. With the Kodak box camera, photography had become accessible to everyone, just as now phone cameras create instant photographs and videos, and we have our own personal exhibition halls on social media. There was also a revolution in the way which photography could be used for mass communication. The halftone process opened opportunities for photographs to illustrate magazines and newspapers from the 1880s. Theatre programmes carried photographic portraits by the Woodburytype process by 1875. Industrial photographs of factories, machinery, sales advertising catalogues and trade fairs also date from this period. Having previously seen photography as a new, burgeoning art form, surely to be as highly-regarded as painting, High Art photography circles needed to find a way to be distinctive. If science and business had reduced their hard-won skills to a mere mechanical process for mass markets, printed advertising and personal “snapshots” – in other words, photographs without creative expression, feeling or emotion - how could photography ever be a recognised art form? Gradually, in a measured way, through links between gifted visionaries, Pictorialism as a movement was born. Despite the word “pictorial” being used initially in 1869, the first formal move by “High Art” photographers was by The Linked Ring, who broke away from the RPS in 1892. Membership was exclusive, by invitation only. The Tyng Collection possesses two prints by Linked Ring member Alexander Keighley. Their works were unique, like paintings or sculptures, having the aims of expressing emotions, of valuing composition and aesthetics, tones and moods, the beautiful and the romantic.

The strength of Pictorialism internationally is reflected in the early purchases for the Tyng Collection, which includes prints by photographers from Austria, Belgium, Germany, Australia, Italy, the United States, Spain and Czechoslovakia. The techniques of printing were of critical importance to the Pictorialists. A print is unique, it can be manipulated and chemically toned in a painterly fashion.

The darkroom techniques involved take many patient years to master. In the Time-Life book The Print, which was published in 1970, the section entitled Great Printmakers of Today begins: “There are only a handful. Among the millions of amateur and professional photographers around the world, the master printmakers may total no more than a few hundred. Yet their influence is out of all proportion to their numbers, for it is they who carry photography into the halls of museums, galleries and salons ... [to be appreciated as] a painting by Rubens, Rembrandt or Picasso would be.” In 1902, Alfred Stieglitz founded Photo-Secession in New York to champion photography as an independent art medium, “... to dignify that profession until recently looked upon as a trade”. His 291 gallery was the first in the United States to exhibit the works of Manet, Cézanne, Matisse and Rodin as well as those of Picasso and avant-garde artist Georgia O’Keefe, in a cross-fertilisation of still more ideas. In 1910, Stieglitz won the debate over “is photography art?” when the Albright Art Gallery in Buffalo purchased fifteen Photo-Secession prints for its permanent collection. For the first time, photographs had been bought by a museum, just as paintings are. In 1924 the RPS awarded Stieglitz the Progress Medal for Camera Work, a costly subscription-only quarterly publication which contained exhibitionquality photogravure prints on textured paper. There were occasional contributions from George Bernard Shaw, who considered printing to be the most difficult process in photography. Modern paintings and sculpture also featured, including drawings by sculptor Auguste Rodin, together with colour Autochrome photographs. But the world after 1918 looked towards a better future, an escape from the ashes of the old world, from the twilight years that had been ravaged by war, revolution and a global pandemic. Homilies to simplicity and nature, diffused city scenes and idyllic landscapes now seemed naïve. The romantic, sensitive, sentimental, unfocused and much-derided “fuzzygraphs” of the Pictorialists no longer suited the mood of the times. Indeed, many of the Pictorialists themselves had moved on to explore different aspects of their art. Modernism brought in hard edges, angular sleek lines and the progress of industrial societies, as a way to break with the past: the Jazz Age; the exuberant Roaring Twenties; aeroplanes and travel; speeding locomotives; stylish automobiles; opulence; cinema and radio entertained and informed; new brighter ideas in architecture in steel, glass and sculpted concrete; the music of Stravinsky and Schoenberg. There were the bold, aspirational graphics of ArtDeco posters for advertising luxury items, consumer goods, the theatre, costumes and fashion. Art movements had brought in new ways of “seeing”: Surrealism, Cubism, Expressionism, Abstract.

In 1921, the Pictorial Group was formed within the RPS, although by 1928 it held a meeting, the subject of which was, “Some Reasons for the Limited Appeal of Pictorial Photography.” As Derek Reay, former Chairman of the Pictorial Group, wrote in the Visual Art magazine of Spring 2001, “It was within this environment that, in 1927, Stephen Tyng gave the Society £1000 for the establishment of a Foundation for the encouragement of pictorial photography.”

Pictorialism today: the RPS Visual Art Group is linked to the Tyng Collection, which is held in the V&A Museum. The VAG Committee choose Selectors who recommend – together with the V&A - prints to purchase to add to the Collection, which now is comprised of 221 photographs. The Tyng Foundation, created by Stephen H Tyng in 1927, has five Trustees who administer the fund which pays for additions to the Collection. The Kunstbibliothek [Art Library], Staatliche Museen zu Berlin has an excellent Piktorialismus-Portal (please see the link below), largely in both German and English. “The Pictorialism Portal aims first and foremost to enable research into the history of the imagery, publications, and exhibitions associated with art photography from around 1900 in the Germanspeaking realm.” The Kunstbibliothek hosted an international symposium in November 2013, with presentations on Julia Margaret Cameron and the Pictorialist movement in Russia, in France, in Scandinavia and in Germany. The website has links to museums, libraries and databases around the world. 680 Pictorialist works can be seen on the website. Future articles will continue to explore Pictorialism as a movement. Anyone interested in the genre will be rewarded by an internet search for the work of Belgian Léonard Misonne, with its beautiful tones and atmospheric use of contre-jour. His Les bûcherons (The Log Cutters) was purchased for the Tyng Collection in 1934. Andrew Leeming is a Trustee of the Tyng Foundation and Tyng Co-ordinator on the VAG Committee.

THE ROYAL PHOTOGRAPHIC SOCIETY OF GREAT BRITAIN - 1107831 (charitycommission.gov.uk) Visual Art magazine, Spring 2001 Alfred Stieglitz: Aperture The Print; Time Life Books (which shows a facsimile of Stieglitz’s Camera Work) A Concise History of Photography: Helmut and Alison Gernsheim Photography: A Dictionary of Photographers, Terms and Techniques: Jorge Lewinski The Picture History of Photography: Peter Pollack History of Photography Techniques and Equipment: Camfield and Deidre Wills Pictorialism into Modernism: The Clarence H. White School of Photography: Marianne Fulton Clarence H .White: Aperture South with Endurance: Shackleton’s Antarctic Expedition 19141917 - The Photographs of Frank Hurley https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pictorialism http://piktorialismus.smb.museum/ Kunstbibliothek – Staatliche Museen zu Berlin (German/English) Secret Knowledge: David Hockney The Complete Guide to Painting and Drawing, Techniques and Materials: Colin Hayes Mauve: How One Man Invented a Color That Changed the World: Simon Garfield Degas: Passion and Intellect: Henri Loyrette Art Deco: The Golden Age of Graphic Art & Illustration: Michael Robinson and Rosalind Ormiston Art Deco 1910 - 1939; Benton, Benton and Wood (eds.); V&A Publishing Surrealist Painting 1919 - 1939: José Pierre The Life and Works of Kandinsky: Bekah O’Neill The Art of the Expressionists: Janice Anderson

Les bûcherons (c.1934) Léonard Misonne Ladies of the circus (1953) C. A. Yarrington Join the band (1954) Adolph Fassbender HonFRPS Capitol fog (1957) Grant Haist FRPS