Modern Photography – The Studio Annual Camera Art – 1941-1942

The Editor’s Forward

In making up this eleventh issue of “Modern Photography” we anticipated differences and difficulties. Two years of war we felt. Were bound to have laid their mark upon our material, and either we should have a book which reflected with sickening fidelity the make-shift of our present day existence or else a false and useless “picture-book” filled with bathing belles and similar trimmings! This has been the year of the news and news-film photographer, working under more exacting conditions than ever before, and we had thought that these conditions would perhaps have affected the quality of his work, just as we feared that the restrictions on materials, time and opportunities would have affected the work of photographers in general. However, as in so many other spheres, the expected proved to be the actual, and from the point of view of quality, it is difficult to realize that the collection of photographs submitted for this issue is anything but the product of quite normal times, while rising to the occasion, ‘news” photography has become something of great value and even in many cases artistry.

From careful study of the art of wartime photographs there seemed to us to emerge three predominating feelings or trends, one of which lies behind each honest contribution to the photography of the year. Not only, as one might suspect, are there records of different aspects of this world’s conflicts – speaking sharply of the art and opportunism of the news photographer, but there is also a strong turning to pictures which have nothing whatsoever to do with war. The essentially peaceful picture has come forward in its ability to supply the needed pause in our everyday “over-occupation.” This kind of picture, we may say, is war’s opposite number.

Thirdly, there is an outlook, which depicts the world going on as usual. Expressive of the encouragement that comes to us at the first sight of primroses with their sublime unconcern at the pettifogging miscalculations of mankind, or at the efficiency and promptitude with which swallows appear again as usual without the help of the printed timetables or typewritten instructions. It is heartening to know that in Nature’s department at any rate, things are beyond serious disturbance, and that realizing this, man is encouraged to take a leaf out of her book.

In this issue, therefore, we have allowed the photographs to fall naturally under the three broad classifications of “Peace”, “War” and “The World Goes On”. and we trust that readers will find this arrangement helpful. For certain groups of pictures the story seemed to be rounded off by the classic words of various poets and authors, words which often prove that theirs is indeed nothing new under the sun.

“Modern Photography” is an impartial review of the best work and progress of he previous year. Its pages are often open to photographers all over the world and new work is welcome in the early months of each year for consideration in the next forthcoming issue,

Francis Wu of Hong Kong China has one photograph in this book “Portrait Of An Old Woman”

Portrait Of An Old Woman By Francis Wu