Black & white photography / J.W. Waterhouse

I ended last week’s blog with a note that I would continue on the topic of black and white photography. However, my wife put the question to me, ‘Shouldn’t I instead be writing about what I have been doing recently — and am planning to do in the future?’ Well — having checked definitions of blogging on the web —
I think that she is right. Here are 1/ a definition of BLOGS, and 2/ the origin of the acronym:

1/ BLOGS are commonly personal journals/diaries and are used to comment on all sorts of topics depending on the interests of the blogger (author). 

http://www.helpwithpcs.com/jargon/blog.htm

2/ A blog (a contraction of the term "weblog") http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog

Anyway — given that I have in mind a black and white photographic essay — I will at least finish what I started on that topic last week. The impoverishment — in many ways — of the virtual loss of black and white photography (outside at least of the professional sphere). Clearly this need some qualification, given that a colour photograph belongs to a different ‘genre’ to a black and white one; and given that loss of colour photography would indeed be a catastrophic impoverishment. Perhaps the major problem with colour is that it tends to detract — if not overwhelm — the graphic strength of the photo (assuming that it has such strength in the first place). For example, a garish ice cream van in the corner of your photo may ‘jump out’ and spoil the whole image. Whereas that same van in a black and white photo will tend to have a non–disruptive ‘equality of tone’, and may even play an important part in the composition. Here below is an example of the same photo reproduced in colour and in black and white. In this instance the near–monochromatic colour does not in any way unbalance the picture; but I think it is true to say that the graphic qualities and the ‘compositional movement’ are much enhanced in the black and white example. The photograph is of St Mary’s 15th century church, Stone–in–Oxney, Kent, in the county parish of Stone–cum–Ebony. http://stone-in-oxney.kent-towns.co.uk/

Note When I was a boy in the 1950s I had a Voightlander twin–lens reflex camera — as here illustrated (though far from so fine a model). The viewfinder (top lens) was gear–linked to the camera lens, so that focussing was not a problem. Though of course you had to look at the weather, and set the aperture and speed according to gradually–gained experience. Moderately sunny day? 100th at f11, I seem to remember . . .

I cannot remember if colour film was generally available at the time (or if it was simply unaffordable to me), but I thought only in terms of black and white — to the extent that I even wondered for a brief second the other day if the viewfinders on old cameras showed the world in black and white!

J.W. Waterhouse

Yesterday (11 September) my wife and I went to the Waterhouse exhibition at the Royal Academy. It seems that his most well–known painting is The Lady of Shallot, and yet that which I seem to see most often reproduced is Hylas and the Nymphs. In terms of subject–matter — idealised and romanticised Classical scenes — Waterhouse’s paintings are probably most readily associated with Lawrence Alma–Tadema; his Shakespearean and Arthurian paintings ally him to the Pre–Raphaelites; and his colour and idealised feminine beauty find strong echoes in the paintings of Edward Burne–Jones. Waterhouse is, I think, a better painter than Alma–Tadema, but not as fine a colourist as Burne–Jones. I would say that he is a wonderful and delightful painter, rather than a great one. That said, I am not really concerned. Only if he was a bad painter would his work be problematic.

It is reasonable, I think, to presume that all the major figures in his paintings are drawn from studio models. And yet in no instance is there any feeling that they are placed ‘onto’ their settings, rather than being an organic part of them. They are beautifully drawn, perfectly proportioned, and sit, stand, or recline with complete naturalness. It may be said that no one can draw like that now. And that is true, because the training and culture that produced and enabled such draughtsmanship no longer exists. The mistake is, to think that this matters. There is no use for that kind of drawing any longer.

I went to the exhibition fully prepared not to be unduly influenced by the popularity of The Lady of Shallot, but found myself entranced by it. It is, I think, a perfectly beautiful painting. Transcendent would be a good word for it — a tour de force of the ‘manipulation’ of oil paint on canvas. And the face of the Lady of Shallot must be one of the most haunting in the history of painting.

As we were leaving the Royal Academy, my wife overheard a woman say to her husband, ‘Let’s go and see this Waterhouse garbage . . .'

The Lady of Shallot. 1888, Tate Britain