RESTLESS WOMEN

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 76, Issue 108, 10 May 1933, Page 2

RESTLESS WOMEN

LACK OF REPOSE Do the women of to-day lack composure? They arc too restless to sit still long enough to have their photographs taken by the method of fifty years ago. This criticism was made by one oi London’s prominent society photographers, after contrasting photographs of the modern and Victorian eras. Beautiful Lady Randolph Churchill stands in her riding habit of 1885, at the foot of her stairs, serenely holding in a seemingly immovable hand a hunt ing crop. Her large eyes seem to gaze at one with an enviable unchanging calm. This pose was photographed in thirty seconds. In contrast is an atmospheric portrait of Miss Harriet Cohen, the pianist. She is about to play. Her hands are poised pn the keyboard of her piano. She listens for the striking of the first chord. Everything about her suggests suspended movement. This was photographed in half a second. Why- cannot the modern woman sit still for thirty seconds'? It is that wo appear to be sitting quietly and composed, says the photo grapher, but we. lack the immobile poise, the immobile poise, the control over our nerves which made for Lady Randolph Churchill’s clear portrait. Fifty years of crowded life has lost u snot only the power to express “still-life,” but also the inclination. To-day we demand the record of a fleeting mood, the quick expression of an idea. Our background becomes a part of us, indistinct, diffuse, and only the modern camera, with its split-sec-ond lens, can flash us in the lightning changes of our lives.