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Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 17606, 8 November 1922, Page 8

Time was, and that not bo many years ago, when a prominent member of the Boyal Academy would have felt dreadfully insulted if he had been invited to open an exhibition of photographs. This year's exhibition of the Boyal Photographic Society in London was, however, openqd by no less distinguished an artist than Mr Solomon J. Solomon, K.A., one of the leading portrait-painters of the day, who, moreover, made some interesting remarks on the art of the camera, which he placed only a little lower than that of the palette. To secure a satisfactory result, he said, the artistic photographer must have knowledge and perception of the main elements of art, composition, line, balance of grouping, decorative spacing, and massing of light and shade—these were the common possessions of the photographer and artist alike. Mr Solomon held that the wide popularity of photography must Taise the general level of taste. Many of the photographs in the exhibition would decorate a room quite as artistically as a fine mezzo-tint engraving. One does not need to go to London to see photographs of which this could be said with truth. The local exhibitions of the Art Society and the Photographic Society have afforded evidence of the real artistry of some of the work done in New Zealand. Against the impression held by some people thp,t photography is a dull, mechanical art, in which anybody who can hold a camera straight and snap the shutter at the right moment has achieved proficiency, Mr Solomon opposed his strong conviction that the individuality of the photographer is as marked as that of the painter. "All photographers," he said, "have the same kind of instrument and means of manipulation, yet the pictures produced are as varied aB those at an exhibition by painters." The true artist beats the mere tradesman, as Wq may call him, in both cases. Every now and then circumstances are disclosed which suggest that the machinery of local government may sometimes be singularly ineffective. A case in point was brought before the Health Commission in Melbourne in a report by the secretary, who had a day 'or two previously, in company with one of the Commission's inspecvisited the Exhibition Building during tho State Schools' display. He declared that if a fire had broken out while the display was in progress "hundreds of people must have been hopelessly trapped in the burning building." This startling statement was supplemented by the engineer of the Conimission, who said that many important exitß, doorß and gates in the Typilding were fitted with fastenings Which had been condemned as being contrary/to the Commission's requirements. Correspondence with the trustees had been going on for quite thirty years, but the condemned fastenings were , still on the exits. The trustees, it seemed, liad promised that if the fastenings were allowed to remain, the doors would be locked back while a performance was taking place, but the understanding was being neglected. Becently, when hundreds, of people were in the building, only three of the sixteen escape doors were unlocked. It was decided that the defects must be remedied in two months, and that the trustees ,of the Exhibition Building should be asked to show cause why they should not toe prosecuted. But what about the responsible authority who for thirty' years has failed to insist on the removal of this danger 1 Surely if "the trustees' are prosecuted, they, should not stand their trial alone. ♦ What are we to believe? For years past dentists and medical men of every degree of expertness have been warning us of the injurious efffect of sugar upon the teeth, and now Sir James Crichton-Browne, a London doctor of high authority, laughs the theory to scorn. Speaking at a gathering in London recently, Sir James remarked that .food questions were now being discussed as never before; food was the happy hunting-ground of the faddists, and there was no kind of food, he supposed, "that had not been idiotically accused of causing at least half-a-dozen different diseases." The latest instance was furnished by the annual conference of the British Dental Association, when a prominent member had denounced sugar, and had gone so far as to say that sweets, chocolate, and pastry, by promoting the decay of the teeth, were seriously injuring the health of the people, and were doing more harm than drink. "With the profoundest respect to their dental brethren,'? he suggested they Bhould leave .sugar alone. Becent researches into dental decay indicated that it was perhaps attributable to the want of a certain vitamine in the food in early life, and would be best prevented not by giving us sugar, but by taking codliver oil. Sugar perhaps more than any other article of food tended to promote the flow of saliva, and free washing by the salivary fluid conduced more than anything else to the cleansing and preservation of the teeth. Sugar in moderation alao promoted the flow of gastric juice, and so aided digestion. When he was in Jamaica he examined the teeth of the school children thore. More perfect and regular teeth it was impossible to imagine, and yet the mouths of those children were never free from sugar. Once more, what are we to believe t