Paris
Paris, by Mario V. Bucovich, with a preface by Pad Morand, is a book to be most heartily recommended to two large classes of people—those who have been to Paris and those who have not. M. Morand's short preface and the sub-titles beneath the pictures are the only printing that the book contains ; it is one of the new picture-books owing their inspiration to the cinema, which has taught us to appreciate a visual concept without a literary label. Mr. Bucovich has no story to tell ; his aim is simply to communicate his appre. ciation of the beauty of Paris, and he has very wisely eschewed all adjectives, superlatives and explanations, but simply let his camera speak, with the briefest possible sub-title for each picture.
Of course, one can play tricks with the camera just in the same way that one can play tricks with words, and the photo- grapher—as the artist—must inevitably make a personal interpretation of his subject. The admirable quality of the 256 pictures in this book lies in the restraint with which photographic trickery has been used and the very sympathetic personality behind the camera. Mr. Bucovich is in one sense old-fashioned, for though he has command of the most modern technique he is never sensational or—in the self-conscious sense of the word—original, but is occupied exclusively with the beauty of his subject : his is the all too rare art which conceals art ; he neither distorts nor stands on his head as so many of his compeers in time, though not in taste, are apt to do.
The people who have never been to Paris will learn more about it from him than from many guide-books and travel- diaries ; and the people who know la ville lumiere will feel when they have this book that they can always open its pages and go back for a week-end. Probably some of them will regret that a corner which they particularly love has been omitted, and the most obvious of these omissions would seem to be the facade of the Luxembourg and the pool in front of it —the Parisian Round Pond, where the yachts go sailing— but some omissions are inevitable, and upon the whole Mr. Bucovich's view of Paris is very comprehensive, from the grim walls of the Sante Prison to the gargoyles of Notre Dame.
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