If over and above his technical skill the photographer starts with a "vital idea," he may like the painter convey with his photograph "_the moving thrill_" which is the final test of any work of art.
Then perchance, working patiently along the lines here barely indicated, the artist may one day unconsciously achieve that coveted note of true originality which marks a forward step to be hailed and recorded in the great tradition.
We cannot claim for our art any outstanding phenomenon like the interest in the radio that has swept the country this year, or any remarkable development in the science of photography like the invention a few years ago of the Lumière plate. The day may come when our exhibitions will show masses of color on their walls which will make the water-colorists and the miniaturists green with envy, but that day is not yet. And I for one would be sorry to see it come. There is to me a charm about good monotone photography that is all its own and that puts it on a plane with etching, engraving, lithography, and other monotone processes. Of course some artists, strictly so called, object to regarding photography as anything but a mechanical process, but the number of those who would make art a close corporation is happily diminishing.
In fact, the recognition that photography is receiving from accredited representatives of the fine arts makes its position no longer a doubtful one. Any of the arts may be used for commercial purposes, but that fact does not take away from them their rightful place when they are used by competent hands for aesthetic purposes. The increasing number of museums that are opening their exhibition halls to good photography is an evidence that is obvious to all observers. Caustic critics like Joseph Pennell may decry photography, but many able artists and critics, attending exhibitions of photography that are being held in many of our centers of art, are having their eyes opened to the beauty of lens work in the hands of men and women who use the camera with feeling and insight. Then, too, we must not forget the fact that some well-known artists, beginning with D. O. Hill and continuing with Mrs. Kasebier, Frank Eugene, Steichen, and others, have found in the practice of photography a more lasting fame than in any other line of their effort.