Is logical. And I’ll tell you why. Because the Boraxologist told me so. How else to explain the 1906 publication of a small book featuring the work of American Photo-Secession founder members Clarence White and Gertrude Käsebier as a way to convince folks to open new savings accounts at a bank in Rochester, New York?

I’m guessing you have no clue what I’m talking about, but if you happened to be alive in 1904 and flipping through your daily newspaper, chances are good you might have encountered a drawing of a wise old mule-named the Boraxologist—lauding the untold benefits of “20-Mule Team Brand Borax”—a water-softening agent used in the laundry. Today, Borax® is best known as a laundry “booster” and multi-purpose household cleaner. But thanks to the sayings of this mule a century ago, you may have believed the Fountain of Youth and Holy Grail were cleverly disguised in a box—humbly biding time on the general store shelf, awaiting your purchase to give new life to  dirty clothes.

The mind that came up with the mule with the funny sounding name and that little book from the bank was from a gentleman by the name of Otis H. Kean. A book publisher and advertising agent by profession, Kean turned creeds and in his own words, “optimistic aphorisms” into advertising copy by the barrel. “Such things seem to please the people” he said in 1904, regarding his “wisdom” dished out as part of the borax campaign. While reading through much of his published copy in preparation for this post, the modern figure of Don Draper did cross my mind, but of course from the “kinder and gentler” era of the early 20th century. I have no doubt if Kean was given a client’s account with the challenge of selling the benefits of more snow to a group of Eskimos, he would have no hesitation with the challenge. In carrying this mindset forward, Kean’s contact with cutting edge artistic photography by Clarence White and Gertrude Käsebier was simply the opportunity to consummate a marriage: photographs as visual aphorisms if you will.  Why just confine their work to a gallery he may have thought, when it could be the perfect foil in promoting the virtues of opening a new savings account at the just opened Rochester Trust & Safe Deposit Company’s new building?

Boraxologically speaking, how exactly did Mr. Kean persuade or convince this aforementioned gallery owner, none other than Alfred Stieglitz himself, that using White’s and Käsebier’s work was in his best interest? A moot point perhaps, because Kean succeeded in issuing this tiny book, titling it “Homespun Essays—Everyday Thoughts About Everyday Life”, which featured their work. Of course, their encounter may never have happened, but if it did, a conversation between this wisdom spouting advertising man and fierce guardian of the American Photo-Secession would have been amusing to say the least.

My own take on Kean while preparing Homespun Essays for this site is this: a perfectionist with a heart. The specialized books he published in conjunction with his business concern, the Literary Print Shop, were high-class productions and in this regard, his possible saving grace in relation to any possible dealings he may have had with Stieglitz. It wasn’t as if he was opposed to all commerce of course, but you do have to consider Stieglitz was most definitely an anomaly in the gallery world when and if Kean crossed his threshold in pursuit of “business”. This is because his well documented and self-prescribed “fight” for photography in America took the form of fierce protector and champion of White’s and Käsebier’s photography at a time when the very concept of hanging artistic photographs on gallery walls was in itself a revolutionary act. Kean’s involvement with fine printing and his possible business relationship with the Quadri-Color Printing Company in New York City—a firm responsible for the first true, four-color printing in America beginning in 1904, would have also given both a healthy respect for each other and a way to start a meaningful conversation.

Please visit our latest opus on Homespun Essays here, and prepare yourself to be “homespun” if you decide to read the posted essays along with the photographs, where you may smile and even laugh, especially after digesting this following tidbit from the book’s publisher: “The Trust Company never dies, never absconds and is immune from those possibilities of loss that may happen to every individual.” But then again, don’t cry too much when you find out they actually paid 4% interest back then on a savings account.

I’ll admit to never having stepped foot on any Hawaiian island, but I did “drive” a few roads in Honolulu recently thanks to Google’s Street View feature, all for the sake of checking out the topography near Maunalua Park, its proximity to Fort Shafter; the island’s oldest military base nearby, and the more distant city of Honolulu itself, an approximate 11 minute trip according to its algorithmic brain trust.

My reasoning for this is the newest addition to this site, an album of gorgeous gum bichromate photographs circa 1900-1910 I’m calling Hawaiian Landscape | Japanese Garden Album, possibly taken by a very gifted amateur photographer who called senior Army headquarters in Honolulu home. What made me pursue this research path?  Since no attribution or even titles to the photographs exist in the album, I could only rely on the one clue left in it: a single photographic support stamped “Official Business” evidently used as a mailing envelope.

On the back of it is a return address for the United States War Department, based in Honolulu, further known as Headquarters Hawaiian Department. The other clue was the envelope’s addressed recipient. And this is where the trail gets really maddening, because it is mostly deliberately rubbed out. Just enough to fail any military censor but enough for me to figure out it was addressed to a Commanding Officer, also based in Honolulu. More online checking showed the term Hawaiian Department didn’t come into official use until early in 1913, which then presented another conundrum: the final mounted photograph in the album shows a nighttime view of San Francisco’s Market Street during the September, 1904 encampment of the Sovereign Grand Lodge of the United States and Canadian Independent Order of Odd Fellows. 

But photographic archeology can be my peccadillo sometimes. In revisiting “the envelope”, I of course could not leave well enough alone. I went ahead and searched for a Commanding Officer whose first name was Thomas, the name that seems to make sense to my feeble gray matter since the sole letters “Th” appear under the Commanding Officer recipient address stamped on it. The name of Major Thomas J. Smith, who headed the Hawaii Ordnance Depot for the U.S. Army in Honolulu in 1917 was a lone result that turned up, placing it farther away from the working 1900-1910 dates I’ve assigned this album based on the final 1904 image included in it. In that case, I or anyone else may never know who took these lovely- and in the case of surviving artistic photographs from the Hawaiian Islands at the turn of the 20th century- very uncommon and rare photographs.

But the real-life photographer in me does want to give someone credit for them. Were the photographs assembled for the album after the person left military service, if they were ever enlisted in the first place? In that case, the photographer simply re-purposed an old piece of correspondence-addressed to himself or someone else- to throw everyone-and especially yours truly- off his or her trail.

So Aloha to your memory anyway, whomever you are.  And thanks for this record of Hawaii from a place lost in time. If desired, please visit here to begin your Hawaiian vacation.

2012 will mark a century since a lovely collection of photographs of Italy were taken and assembled into a personal, miniature Grand Tour type album recently added to our collection here at PhotoSeed. As photographs, I feel they stand on their own strong merits but alas, an elusive missing piece for posterity is a record of their maker.  Stamped on the cover is the simple title of its’ contents: Jtalien 1912 (Italy 1912).  After purchasing it from a gentleman in Holland several years ago, I quickly deduced the photos were of German origin.

In this regard, language was the clue. Other German material in our archive contains this early spelling for Italy in the German language as well as Italian using the capitol letter “J” instead of an I: Jtalien and Jtalienische. But what sealed the deal for me was the curious addition to the album in the form of a later mounted snapshot of a group of 12 men wearing military clothing. A small sign propped up in front of them states “1914 Feldzug 1915”.

From this photograph I determined they are wearing World War I issue,  Imperial German Army uniforms.  “Feldzug” further translates to “Campaign” in German.  I’m no military expert, but these guys don’t exactly look like they have just returned from the front lines. Instead, they are smiling, one holds a cigar, and another bearded soldier propped up in the back row poses for the camera while placing his hands on the shoulders of his comrades. Two women flank the group and appear to be nurses of some kind. A military hospital setting?  Or perhaps soldiers on an extended R&R assignment?  Is the same elusive photographer responsible for the marvelous images in this album sitting among them? And why not the possibilty one of the nurses could actually be our photographer? How did this album end up in the Netherlands, which remained neutral during The Great War?  For these questions I have no answers at the moment, just more questions.

Another potential clue to the album’s familial origin is the inclusion of a photograph of two women sitting side-saddle on horses. They may only be part of a larger party connected with the album’s fox hunt gathering photographs or merely a separate moment of repose while they take a pleasure ride in another location.

My own hunch is the woman looking directly into the camera on horseback is the same woman shown in a separate album photograph. In it, she presents several gifts-a bottle of wine (?) and clutch of flowers to a group of Italian village children, several barefoot. But again, deductions, not facts.

What I can say conclusively about the album’s 60 or so mounted photographs is they are a visual delight and important record of Italy before the outbreak of World War I. Some of the images are strikingly beautiful: the Italian countryside in particular but also of subject matter one rarely sees in “typical” Grand Tour type albums (not the commercial or snapshot variety) : carefully framed and presented images of dirt roads, life in a back alley,  a woman in bonnet caught unawares while most likely harvesting mussels at the seashore, a mysterious detail of a gate affixed with several crosses as well as many of the country’s famous landmarks and important Roman Catholic churches.

These photographs are not topographical records but instead are done with a pronounced pictorialist aesthetic. Printed in multiple colors (ozobrome-a transfer pigment process-may be a hunch for some) and mounted on colored supports-they are individual jewels waiting for your own critical eye. Please follow this link to make your own Italian pilgrimage to the past.

Archive Highlights Showcases Stellar Material Relevant to the History of Artistic Photography Within the Overall Growing Archive since 2011: be it the Work of a Singular Photographer or in-depth Compilation of Published Material. To see all Highlights please go here.

 

A Pictorialist Italian Grand Tour Album From 1912

This extraordinary album (16.5 x 21.5 x 5.0 cm) of unique loose pigment prints was most likely the work of an unknown German photographer as it is stamped Jtalien (Italy) 1912 on the album recto. This etymological difference for the word Italy is an attribute of the German language, where the capital letter J was often used to replace the capital letter I. (1.) Another strong indicator of a German maker, which we explore further in the accompanying blog post for this album, is the inclusion of a mounted snapshot (2.) showing a group of German World War 1 soldiers-smiling and flanked by two female nurses while posing for a photograph in an unknown location. A small sign propped up by two of the soldiers spells out “1914 Feldzug 1915”, indicating they took part in the first year campaign of the Great War. It is certainly possible one of these soldiers or even one of the nurses is responsible for taking the photographs making up the album.

Album Particulars

The album contains views of several well known Italian landmarks, including the Colosseum and Arch of Constantine in Rome as well as St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City. However, most of the views in the album are not done in typical tourist snapshot fashion, but instead from an artistic viewpoint. For example, one of the more interesting photographs from a compositional perspective shows the dome of St. Peter’s— sprouting from the horizon line of an expanse of open fields before it. This atypical photographic vantage point seems deliberately sought out, with the final result a pleasing balance of open sky, the earth below and mankind’s illuminating achievement sandwiched between both.

Multiple building, cityscape and countryside views, coastline, native citizen and recreational photographs of Italy are included in this album, most done in our estimation with deliberate thought and with a pictorialist sensibility.

We have chosen to label these as pigment prints, owing to their multiple color variations and with the understanding that more than one process may have been used in their making, possibly including carbon, gum bichromate, ozobrome or other media. Additionally, some of the photographs have been mounted on trimmed art-paper supports within  the impressed window openings on their respective colored cardstock mounts. (3.) It also seems likely the author of these works used a small camera. Since most of the prints average 3 1/4 x 4 1/4” in size, it is conceivable the original negatives were produced using a roll film type camera similar to the 3A Folding Pocket Kodak type or similar. If the photographer owned this model, the advantage of a viewfinder that could be shifted 90 degrees in order to take horizontal images would also explain the two formats represented in the album. On a provenance note, the album was purchased in late 2009 from a former owner in the Netherlands.  Additional insight into this album is  welcomed.

NOTES:

1. LETTER J: FROM: DE.WIKIPEDIA.ORG: ACCESSED: 2011
2. THIS PHOTOGRAPH IS CENTER MOUNTED ON A SUPPORT CONSISTENT AND NATIVE TO THE ALBUM.
3. THESE MOUNTS SHOW EVIDENCE THEY WERE CUT FROM LARGER SHEETS AS THEY ARE NOT ALL UNIFORM. THEIR EDGES ARE OFTEN LEFT ROUGH-INDICATING THEY MAY HAVE BEEN INDIVIDUALLY CUT BY HAND USING A STRAIGHT-EDGE AS A GUIDE RATHER THAN A CLEAN CUT THAT WOULD BE EXPECTED WITH THE USE OF A RAZOR OR KNIFE. THE DIMENSIONS OF MANY OF THE IMPRESSED WINDOW OPENINGS IN WHICH EACH PRINT IS GLUE-MOUNTED IN THE CORNERS IS 9.4 X 11.9 CM BUT OTHER SIZES EXIST FOR THE ALBUM. AND LIKE THE SUPPORT MOUNTS, THESE EMBOSSED WINDOW OPENINGS ARE NOT UNIFORM IN TERMS OF THEIR LOCATION ON EACH SUPPORT. IT WOULD APPEAR THE PHOTOGRAPHER HAND-SIGHTED THE TEMPLATE TO CREATE EACH EMBOSSED WINDOW ON THE RECTO OF THE MOUNT BEFORE PRESSURE WAS APPLIED IN ORDER TO CRIMP THE MOUNTS. EVIDENCE ON THE MOUNT VERSO TYPICALLY SHOW BURNISHING ABRASIONS IN THE CORNER AREAS OF THE WINDOW AS WELL.

The process of preparing material for this website has been a real education for me.  In picking apart and studying the components making up the two latest French portfolios added: L’Épreuve Photographique (The Photographic Print) for 1904 and 1905, knowledge has come in both large waves and tiny revelations. One of these waves has been some of the poetic, profound, and often humorous writing of French art historian and critic Émile Dacier. 

Here is an example of him speaking of his perceptions on the artistic photographic plates-included in his preface to the 1904 portfolio:

“These are the memories of distant lands, these are the tragedies and comedies of the street where chance is the great director, and here the pressure of crowds, the galloping squadrons, the shock waves on the breakers…”

And earlier, his delightful account of Photography and photographers in the dark ages-before their creative impulse was set free:

“Photographers! These terrifying figures to children that their souls have kept long stubborn grudges! …To visit these murderers as children we had to dress up-like the condemned.  After the mandatory cutting of the hair, torture ensued by the shaking of the neck yoke…”

Tiny revelations: the editor of L’Épreuve Photographique, Roger Aubry, was not only a photographer and inventor, but a passionate balloonist who survived a crash into the Grand Palais in 1905 while taking photographs above Paris. And another: the very typeface that survives in some of the signage used in the Paris Métro train stations- Auriol, was designed by namesake George Auriol, a French artist, type and graphic designer who used his new typeface as well as other Art Nouveau elements in his commission of  L’Épreuve Photographique by the Paris publisher Librairie Plon.

 In 1903, Aubry had taken over the editorship of the Librairie Plon’s  Annuaire Général et International de la Photographie. (General and International Directory of Photography) Published in Paris, this was an annual encompassing a little bit of everything photographic, but with a more scientific focus in keeping with the tradition of the publication. I was fortunate to have bought a copy of the 1905 edition many years ago, and used it as a reference work when preparing these galleries.  “Directeur”, another way of saying “Editor”, is the title assigned Aubry for this publication as well as for L’Épreuve Photographique.  My respect for his work in compiling these portfolios keeps in step with the tradition of the enlightened city of Paris, their place of publication. We have additionally prepared a PhotoSeed Highlight for this work here, with a further link to all 96 plates making up the portfolios.