The Craze of the Camera.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXXIX, Issue 3, 20 July 1907, Page 34

The Craze of the Camera.

1 am not going to write about the craze of the camera: that we used to carry about with us dor the purpose of .snapshotting the familiar objects of the street or the common objects of the seashore. Of course, a good many of us are still ardent amateur photographers, but the linnd camera is not quite so much in evidence as it used to be. Bridge and motoring, and the fact that the picture postcard industry, has now left no spot on 4he habitable globe unphotographed, may have something to do with the less general display of the little square black box that once seemed to be a much a part of our outdoor equipment as an umbrella ill dune, or a parasol in November. The. camera that 1 have in my opinion is not the one that you stand behind, but the one that you

pose in front of. Where the “craze” appears to me to come in is in the desire of the ordinary sitter to be represented with a conventional smile in a .conventional attitude, and so unmistakably “pbsed” for effect that every atom of “naturalness", has disappeared. I have a charming portrait of a sister-in-law taken when she was a little girl. She is sitting on a rock with the boundless mean behind her ami sunshine over her head. and. she is dressed for an evening party. She smi|es at the picture now. and so do I, but ate not many of the modern photographs equally absurd in what I think artists call their “composition”? A year ago most, of aur

charming young actresses appeared in the popular illustrated journals in their

motor-cars. There was such a strong familv resemblance in most of the cars

that it was evident to the casual observer that the ear used ininanv cases

was a photographer's dummy. When that fact had lieen generally recognised, there was a sudden disappearance of the sham automobile from the professional photograph. It was a great relief. There was something really, not quite dignified iu a girl silting behind a canvas arrange-

ment to be photographed in order to make the publie believe that she possessed a thousand-guinea motor-car. No self-respecting woman would b? photographed in u dummy brougham to give the public, ar friends and aquaintances the impression that she kepta carriage. 'Tho sham tnotoring photograph always brought to my mind the 'story of the young shop assistant who paid a shilling extra fur a coloured photograph on the condition that the colourist put a large diamond pin in his scarf and gave him a large gold watch chain. After the .sham motor-ear had gone into the garage of Good-bye. many charming publie favourites, or fair flowers of the musical comedy parterre, were photographed “at home”—that is to say iu the domestic interior. But they were invariably photographed in the drawingroom, surrounded by bric-a-brac, and posed in an attitude which bespoke pride of possession. This, of course, was a “professional” photograph, and was suggested by the photographer and not by the victim of the fierce glare of publicity that beats upon thet stage, 1 am reminded of these things by two charming photographs 1 have just received from male friends of ours who occupy high official positions. Both are photographed at their office table, surrounded by piles of documents, and they are gazing intently at a business communication which is apparently of a most important and engrossing character. These photographs have made n great impression upon me. They are so essentially superior in dignity to the photographs of my female friends that adorn my own particular room. All iny female friends arc, in their photographs, jnore or less frivolously} occupied. Gne is stroking a dog—another is nursing a eat. One is bending over a bowl of roses—another is carelessly turning the leaves of an album. One is smiling broadly, with the evident intention of displaying a most perfect set of teeth Another is reclining in a photographer’s hammock, suspended between two property trees. I have In iny possession only one photograph of a woman who is represented as seriously, usefully, or profitably engaged. The craze of the camera so far ‘as modern woman is concerned, is idleness and frivolity. Your friried may be the most, domesticatedl woman in the world, the angel of her home,tho model housekeeper, the devoted wife, the perfect mother, a pattern of industry, but in Hie photograph you have of her she sits the listless' embodiment of the immortal wish of the dear old workhouse lady whose idea of Heaven was “doing nothing for ever and ever.” Has not the time come for a new note in personnal photography? The old lines have been pursued to the point of weariness. The gift of invention seems to have departed from the'studios ->f the West. With the greatest diffidence, hesitatingly, and with a plea for pardon by way of preface, I would suggest that women should their domestic qualities and their gifts of usefulness, and call upon their camera to bear witness to them. Many women who are handing themselves down to their descendants as inhaling the perfumu of roses alight be thought more highly of if their grand-

children, turning to the old family album, could gaze at them in the act of detecting an error in the butcher’s book, or pointing out to the housemaid a little patch of dust under the clock upon the diningroom mantelpiece. A fair, gentle face bending over a piece of useful fancy work would compare favourably with any fair face bending over a muff dog. 1 have a photograph of a great popular actress putting coals on the fire. There is the domestic note at once. It is, much more dignified, too, -to be -seen putting coals on the fire than coming out of an egg. ' >

Turning to our sisters in a different walk of life, how much more, gratifying to many a prospective husband it would be to look upon the counterfeit presentment of his bespoken bride in the act of making apple dumplings than arrayed in her best walking costume and a vacant smile, herJhand leaning on the back of an ugly chair against a, background of marble balustrade and bluue lake not to be found within three miles of Tottenham Court Road. 1 have only seen one photograph of a girl dressed as a housemaid with her dustpan and broom bravely , displayed. And the photograph was not that of a real .housemaid, but of a young lady journalist who was pretending to be one. Of course that made all the difference — Mrs. Geo. R. Sims in “M-A.l*."