Ansel Adam was a man often considered to be the father of modern landscape photography with his famous landscape work of big mountains and rivers/lakes. Being born in 1902 he grew up in California in the sand dunes amid the golden gate. As he grew older after his family being largely effected by a volcano his father helped him pursue his creative roots and ideas even when not fitting in at school with a more traditional style of education. Progress in school until he gained a ‘legitimising diploma’ and soon after spent the majority of his time outdoors hiking, climbing and observing what was on his door step. However his photography career did not begin here so much as he taught himself to read and play music quickly becoming his occupation until he gave it up for photography, not after having learnt many important lessons of planning and patience from the music. As his love for photography progressed using the Brownie box camera his parents gave him, he joined the Sierra Club in 1919 looking after their memorial cabin located in the Yosemite Valley in which he spent four summers growing and learning while meeting fellow conservation enthusiasts. This club gave Adam’s so much of his life not only did he meet his wife during his time there but it was essential to starting his photography career, starting with his first publishing being in the clubs bulletin. As time continued to progress the clubs yearly month long trip during the summer, quickly grew in popularity with having up to 200 attendees. Adams now being on the board of directors for the club as well as now being the trip photographer/artists, he strayed further from a concert pianist and realised he could make a living off of his work. The most life changing year in Adam’s career was 1927 when he took his first ‘visualized’ photo which became what he was known for and how he created all of his work. Adams only grew in popularity and fame from here as his work grew and began being featured in more and more shows all the while his new techniques and talents shone through and taught so many others. Later on in his career he met  Edward Weston who himself is a hugely important and influential photographer. This pair was quickly noticed by Group f/64 who did so much for the duo presenting shows of their work together and helping Adam’s have his first solo exhibition in a museum, although this group did not last long they brought a whole new idea to ‘straight’ or ‘raw’ photography works and looking at photography as though it what the eye would see. Time went on and Adam’s was forced to do more and more commercial work but even for this he had an unusual talent for this as well but he felt it limited his creativity that the entire reason he started photography in the first place. Adam’s was revolutionary not only for his creativity but he was a master with all the technical sides of camera, he developed the ‘zone’ system that is still used and completely changed how other photographers looked at their own work and his. He was looked up to greatly in a lot of other aspects of his life, whether it being his social company or his sheer passion for the environment and preserving it.

American west, why?

Adams was also a tireless conservationist and wilderness preservationist who understood the power of a strong image to sway public and political opinion. His stirring images of US national parks have no doubt always inspired a desire to protect the natural world.

Group f/64

64, loose association of California photographers who promoted a style of sharply detailed, purist photography. The group, formed in 1932, constituted a revolt against Pictorialism, the soft-focused, academic photography that was then prevalent among West Coast artists.

Goup f/64 included: Ansel Adams, Imogen Cunningham, John Paul Edwards, Preston Holder, Consuelo Kanaga, Alma Lavenson, Sonya Noskowiak, Henry Swift, Willard Van Dyke, Brett Weston, and Edward Weston.

Zone system

The zone-system of Ansel Adams divides the photo into eleven zones; nine shades of grey, together with pure black and pure white. You could assume that a normal photo does not contain pure black and pure white. Therefor the nine shades of grey would be the only zones you can find in a photo

Comparison

Romanticism: a movement in the arts and literature that originated in the late 18th century, emphasise, inspiration, subjectivity, and the primacy of the individual.

Both romanticism and Ansel Adams both have the ideas of human creativity. In photography, photographers who took up the romanticist approach aimed to sensationalise the overall look of their mages by enhancing certain colours to make the image look almost surreal, glorified and they wanted to dramatize certain areas of their photographs.

Ansel Adams uses black, white and grey to romanticises his images with a dramatic effect. He uses the perfect contrast of all colours so there isn’t too much of one.

One difference with Ansel and romanticism is, a lot of romanticism used in pictures uses colour, Ansel Adams doesn’t.

Influence on others

Ansel Adams is known for his artistry in what has become known as Landscape Photography. He also contributed to advancing the technical aspects of bringing this artistry to light. In this class, you will learn some of Ansel’s important innovations to photography and how they relate to your modern digital camera.