Faldoni, parts 2808 - 2811

 2808. It was a drawing of a model he especially liked, and after the pose was done and the model had gone home, he labored at the drawing for many hours, elaborating the details from his imagination. The drawing in the shop window was the same sort of inspired image, and like his own drawing, it seems to be that sections of it were left unfinished and rather hazy.

 

2809. It is only gradually that it dawns on Mr. Hunt that he is not looking at a drawing but an object that was created by a machine and the utilization of chemicals in a laboratory. When he looked very carefully at the object this is what he noticed: the clothing appeared to be unfinished as when in a drawing something is left undone, or scrubbed out with the eraser. But the unfinished parts were full of very faint mathematically accurate detail.

 

 2810. That there might be perfectly rendered details in the unfinished portions of a drawing he knew was an impossibility, and as he was trying to figure out this enigma, he happened to notice the sign board in the windows which explained that he was looking at a daguerreotype. 

 

2811. Poor Mr. Holman Hunt. Just for a moment we will imagine that he is not just Mr Hunt, but a combination and amalgamation of all the artists who have ever lived. In his blood and in his bones, in his genetic makeup are all of those individuals who dedicated their lives to trying to figure out how on earth one goes about getting what the eye sees down onto a piece of paper so other people might understand it.