Ansel Adams Early Childhood:

Ansel Adams, born in San Francisco in 1902 before the “The Great Quake”, four years later he broke his nose in an accident and disfigured his face. Due to this as well as not fitting in at school, he struggled a lot in school land due to this moved to many school throughout his childhood until his father decided to pull him out out of education and get him a tutor. Near Ansel’s home he often walked around sand dunes and trees and found solace and a sense of support/comfort in it.

When he was younger Ansel had an interest for music as well as photography and he wanted to become a musician as he enjoyed playing on the piano, after some time he decided he wasn’t cut out for it and at age 14 he received his first ever Kodak Box Brownie Camera. At this age Ansel and his family would visit the Yosemite National Park as well as the Sierra Nevada mountainous range and from there he continued with his passion for photography.

Growing up/His background:

Ansel Adams was a well known American photographer and environmentalist. He was an advocate of environmental protection, national parks and as well as creating a legacy of responses to the power of nature and sublime conditions around. an He was known for his black and white photographs of the American West. Ansel helped found the group “Group f/64”, it was an association of photographers which advocated “pure” photography (they favoured a sharp focus and the use of the full tonal range of a photograph). Other members in this Group f/64 included Edward Weston, Imogen Cunningham (among other female photographers who had been overlooked in photography/history) and as well as Dorothea Lange.

• Imogen Cunningham and William Van Dyke

In terms of his landscape work I believe that his work is very interesting and is explainable for the amount of attention his previous work has gotten, I understand how the mountainous regions, to the lakes to the swaying grass can effect the attention and can gather there attention as his work is very mesmerising and can be adored when looked at, I believe that especially during modern day when Global Warming is a big factor in society and park preserves and landscapes don’t appear the same as many decades ago. I believe an audience can also find his work appealing as they find a sense of comfort in the fact that the range looked so calm and lively in the nature aspect despite the photographs being monochromatic.

Ansel Adams Advocate for wildlife and preservationist:

Ansel was known for his courage and constant battle with congress in order to preserve the landscapes, he dedicated his life to this nature, advocating for the protection of wilderness areas and he did not just allow “his photographs to do all the talking”. His advocacy included: essays, letters, speeches and trips to the US Congress.

In Ansel’s autobiography he wrote that “I knew my destiny when I first experienced Yosemite”. As a young boy he took his very first photographs there and continued to return to it repeatedly through his lifetime. Yosemite National Park was central to both his photography outcomes but as well as his environmental activism.

Ansel had framed his photographs to cut out any trace of human activity in the areas, bringing forth the “untouched” wilderness. As in the Yosemite which were captured in Adams’s photographs Yosemite Falls crashes down severely, a winter storm clears over Inspiration Point, and Half Dome rises like a monolith over the snow-covered Tenaya Peak.

“The final Sierra report also predicts greater snow losses during both drought years and very wet years. The findings suggest that longer, hotter dry seasons would follow the wet seasons, drying out plants that grew in those water-rich months and making record wildfires such as the state saw in 2017 more common. Extreme weather could also lead to additional challenges in flood control.”

This report can further emphasise my point where individuals can find a sort of peace in time as they can be used to such change in terms of the climate and weather overall that they feel relief and calmness.

His technique:

Ansel Adams photographed using mostly black and white film and large format cameras. He enhanced the landscapes by using yellow or orange filters in order to make the skies appear darker.

Ansel was never shy about dodging and burning to create the image he wanted despite being seen as a photographer who never manipulated his images.

The technique name he used was called “Visualisation”, it requires the photographer to take in a subject without a camera and imagining how the final photo will come out. In modern day the term “previsualisation” is used for this technique despite the concepts being the same.

In his “zone-system” technique Ansel divides the photograph into eleven zones; nine shades of gray; together with pure black and pure white. (“You could assume that a normal photo does not contain pure black and pure white. Therefore the nine shades of gray would be the only zones you can find in a photo.”)

The Zone System applies as much colour, digital and video as it does to black and white. It allows to get your the right exposure “every time without guessing”. Ansel Adams presents this in “The Negative” (his book where he cover the use of artificial and natural light, film and exposure as well as darkroom equipment and techniques) where he even shows the viewer how to use it and shoot cameras.

 zone 5 being middle gray, zone 0 being pure black (with no detail), and zone 10 being pure white (with no detail)

• I experimented with Lightroom and used specifically three photos that I wanted to bracket in the specific locations.
• I imported these test images taken of buildings and nature/greenery.

• In the image above it is presented that the the merge went ahead and the level can be adjusted, the medium/highest level seems the best appearance when looked at the image.

• The image above presents the photograph in it’s best selection and the merge which does not look to dark yet too bright. This middle selection works best with all the elements presented as the darker features of the building contrasting to the sky which contrasts in terms of the grassy areas in the centre-lower area of the photographs.

• I decided to merge another photograph in a similar environment taking in the same process I did in the previous photograph. As well as choosing the medium level as it suited it the best with the different tonalities.

The image above presents the merge between the three different shadowed photographs. I believe the merge in HDR bracketing is a god option when choosing the right scale for the landscape and nature like photographs as it suits it well.

Own Interpretation/ Opinion of artwork:

The artwork (called “Noon”) clearly presents as the central focus on the three horses pulling what appears to be a large “farm wagon” across the river from the cottage on the left. The people presented in the off centre look like some sort of workers if not labour for the individuals that live in the well established cottage. The artwork can also highlight the social class of the subjects, even though there are not any “higher class” individuals present in the image the house speaks for itself as it can show that the house is in a higher position than the individuals therefore it stands in a higher class compared to the workers opposing the household.

Information of the artwork:

Originally called Landscape: Noon.

The image can depict a rural scene on the River Stour between English Counties Essex and Sussex.

Is one of most popular and greatest english paintings as well as being regarded as “Constable’s most famous image”.

Willy Lott Cottage still survives practically unaltered, but none of the trees in the painting exist today.

reflections on water, the shadows beneath the willows, the smells, the sounds – while waiting for a bite.’  Constable wrote of a “painting of a mill” by Jacob van Ruisdael, that he could ‘all but see the ells [eels]’ in its water. ‘The most famous of all Constable’s statements was sparked/adapted by the topic of fishing.

In 1821 the younger John Fisher wrote, mentioning that he had been up to his middle in a fine/ deep New Forest river and as happy as a ‘careless boy’.  He caught two pike and thought of John Constable.  In reply, John Constable produced an amazing sequence of free sensory cooperation:’

“The sound of water escaping from Mill dams… Willows, Old rotten Banks, slimy posts, & brickwork. I love such things… As long as I do paint I shall never cease to paint such places….“

What is the Romantism period? Where? How?

• The Romantic period began roughly around 1798 and lasted until 1837 (Peaked during 19th century/Times can be negotiable). During this period the political and economic atmosphere was heavily influenced, many writers finding inspiration from the French Revolution. It was a movement in the arts and literature, it was characterised by emotion and by imagination and by individualism (constant poetry of emotions/subjective own opinion/not factual).
• Other focuses in the Romantism era was an emphasis on nature, freedom of form and the exploration of the Gothic and unknown.
• The main idea of Romanticism is that it is the celebration/the movement (of the 18th and 19th centuries) of the individual, idealisation of women as well the emphasis of emotion and glorification of the past and present (medieval over classical).

Linking French Revolution with the Romantisism period

• It had a significant impact on on the work of romantic poets, it inspired the themes of of liberty, equality and individuality in their poetry
• The Revolutions ideals of freedom and social change resonated with the romantic movement, making them lead to themes of and exploring nature, rebellion and passion in their work.

Social Change

During this change many things happened like:

• Calls for the abolition of slavery became louder and there was a lot more writing that was open about their objections.
• People moved away from the countryside and farmland and into the cities after the Agricultural Revolution.
• Where the Industrial Revolution provided jobs as well as technological innovations that after would spread onto the US in the 19th century, Romanticism was a reaction against this spread of industrialism.
• As well as the criticism of aristocratic and social norms (“ruling” social class) and a call for more attention to nature).

The Sublime

The sublime (from the Romantism era) in my opinion is the overwhelming feeling of awe mixed with terror in it’s most “fearsome”, as well as danger (Edmund Burke’s Philosophical Enquiry (1757)). Edmund saw “nature” as the “most sublime object, capable of generating the strongest sensations in its beholders”.

He was not the first philosopher to be intrigued and interested by the power/ complexity of the idea of the sublime but his account of it was very influential. Edmund broke the idea of the sublime down into seven aspects, all of which he argued were visible in the natural world and in natural phenomena:

Darkness – which constrains the sense of sight (primary among the five senses)
Obscurity – which confuses judgement
Privation (or deprivation) – since pain is more powerful than pleasure
Vastness – which is beyond comprehension
Magnificence – in the face of which we are in awe
Loudness – which overwhelms us
Suddenness – which shocks our sensibilities to the point of disablement

‘The sublime’ is many things: a judgement, a feeling, a state of mind and a kind of response to art or nature. By about 1700 an additional theme started developing, which was that sublime in writing, nature, art or in human conduct was regarded as of “such exalted status” that it was beyond normal experience, maybe even beyond the reach of understanding in human. As well as generally regarded as beyond comprehension and beyond measurement.

It has been long understood to mean “a quality of greatness or grandeur that inspires awe and wonder”.

Edmund thought that the ruling principle of the sublime was that “terror is in all cases whatsoever, either more openly or more hidden and not obvious in the moment”.

Theodore Rosseau- “In the 1820s he began to paint out-of-doors directly from nature, a novel procedure at that time.” (19th Century (1801-1900)).

Nicolas Poussin-“Poussin sketched in the Campagna, the countryside around Rome, with Claude, and from the late 1630s began to paint landscapes. He brought a powerful discipline to the composition of his paintings, which enhanced the solemnity of their subjects.” (17th Century (1601-1700)).

Ansel Adams-“After he received his first camera in 1916, Adams also proved to be a talented photographer. Throughout the 1920s, when he worked as the custodian of the Sierra Club’s lodge in Yosemite National Park, he created impressive landscape photographs.” (20th Century (1901-2000)).

Albrecht Altdorfer-“Altdorfer’s piece, Landscape with footbridge (1517-1520), is attributed as the first pure landscape piece in oil, done in a style he developed from Cranach.” (16th Century (1501-1600)).

Pierre-Henri de Valenciennes-“The present writer and others have suggested that during the 1781-1782 encounter, Vernet introduced Valenciennes to the practice of painting landscape oil studies in the open air. (18th Century 1701-1800)).

JMW Turner was an English Romantic era landscape painter whose “expressionistic studies of light, colour and atmosphere where unmatched in their range and sublimity”.

JMV Turner’s became known as ‘the painter of light’, because of his increasing interest in brilliant colours as the main constituent in his landscapes and seascapes. His works including water colours, oils and engravings. JMV Turner was born near Covent Garden in London and entered the Royal Academy Schools in 1789.

Landscape

Landscape can be described as ‘the visible features of an area of land, often considered in terms of their aesthetic appeal’. The term “landscape” comes from/derives from the Dutch word landschap, which originally meant “region, tract of land” but got the artistic connotation, “a picture depicting scenery on land” in the early 1500s. Landscape, like photography, is a relatively modern idea.

The meaning of landscape is the visible features of land, it’s landforms and how they integrate with natural or human made features.

16th Century

Landscape painting was only officially considered as an independent genre in the 16th century.

Landscape as an “independent genre did not emerge in the Western tradition and culture until the Renaissance in the 16th century”. Earlier work of Albrecht Altdorfer can be see during this period. –

Altdorfer’s piece, Landscape with footbridge (1517-1520), is attributed as the first pure landscape piece in oil, done in a style he developed from Cranach.” (16th Century (1501-1600)).

17th Century

Classical Landscapes emerged as a genre in the 17th century.

These landscapes were influenced by classical antiquity and sought to illustrate an ideal landscape recalling Arcadia, a legendary place in ancient Greece known for its quiet pastoral beauty.

Nicolas Poussin was a prominent Classical Landscape artist-“Poussin sketched in the Campagna, the countryside around Rome, and from the late 1630s began to paint landscapes. He brought a powerful discipline to the composition of his paintings, which enhanced the solemnity of their subjects.” (17th Century (1601-1700)).

Late 18th/19th Century

Landscape paintings it eventually gained the prominence in the late 18th century with the rise of Romanticism. These artists sought to celebrate nature over industrialisation and emotion over reason. They often depicted landscapes to show an appreciation for natural landscapes, away from urban expansion and industrialisation.

Theodore Rosseau- “In the 1820s he began to paint out-of-doors directly from nature, a novel procedure at that time.” (19th Century (1801-1900)).

JMW Turner was an English Romantic landscape painter whose “expressionistic studies of light, colour and atmosphere where unmatched in their range and sublimity”.

JMV Turner’s became known as ‘the painter of light’, because of his increasing interest in brilliant colours as the main constituent in his landscapes and seascapes. His works including water colours, oils and engravings. JMV Turner was born near Covent Garden in London and entered the Royal Academy Schools in 1789.

Photography

Though the earliest evidence of landscape photography was taken between the years 1826 and 1827, it was an urban landscape photo taken by a French inventor by the name Nicephore Niepce.

Around the mid nineteenth century, the invention of photography revealed that cultures were prepared to form knowledge, beliefs and fantasies through optical and reproducible images. During this time, industrialisation began a process of changing where people lived, according to how people worked.

Within such broad change, more specifically, economically advanced industrial nations, railways introduced unmatched speed of travel and early forms of international tourism developed. Images from distant places influenced how familiar places came to be depicted.

As processes of work and travel altered through modernisation/distance began to characterise human relations to place. Land became increasingly perceived as landscape, and landscape increasingly encountered as picture. Photographs became established amidst a variety of forms of landscape pictures.

HDR in images:

These landscape images are enhanced with HDR (High-Dynamic-Range imaging) using a tripod to taken in a steady photograph and include many of the wonders presented on the image such as the the sunset the different autumn coloured trees, the pink toned and shadowed rocks to the reflected lake in the centre and general middle of the photograph.

The tripod holding the camera in place will ensure that the photographer will be able to use the lowest ISO and a proper aperture to capture everything you need presented in focus (The shutter speed doesn’t matter for HDR photos unless you want specifically to create a much longer exposure). The HDR setting is useful when you can have difficulty/trouble balancing a photo’s light.

It is obviously used to and designed to capture high-contrast scenes and bringing them to ours eyes more convincingly.

Questions to consider?

• How successful were my final outcomes?
• Did I realise my intentions going forward?
• What refernces did I make to artist references- ( commenting on technical, visual, contextual,, conceptual?)
• Is there anything I would do differently/change etc.

I believe that my final outcomes were successful. The parts of the project especially Masculinity and Femininity that I enjoyed was bring able to be creative and experiment with the playing around with photographs/ideas such as using the mirror, playing around with hair and experimenting what bit of the human skin and body can be considered to be more masculine and feminine and taking close up shots of elements specific to that.

I realised my intentions going forward and the motive that I was going for, I wanted each photoshoot to focus on individual parts that we consider more or less feminine or masculine.

Reference to artist references that I have made in my photoshoots have been Cindy Sherman where I have followed and took inspiration from her work and specifically inside the house photographs representing a housewife aesthetic. As well as taking photographs of Cindy Sherman I took photographs inspired by Lauren Withrow where she took field-like photographs of the subject and mysterious like images with themes of secrecy, abandonment and confusion.

One of the challenges that I faced in this project was timing and lighting. I believe that if I spent more time on the photoshoots and looked more specifically at the setting of the camera/how to make the photographs appear more intense and change the background inside the studio-like photographs in some of the photoshoots I think there would be more appealing approach towards my outcome of photographs.

Another aspect were I could have improved in my photoshoots is the blurriness in some of my photographs. I could have looked back on my photographs, see what didn’t work well specifically in what background did the blurriness occur/did it ruin the photograph or appear better with the rest of the photographs/if it pairs well.

• My final outcomes very successful in my opinion as they came how I wanted them too. I’m especially proud of the first edit despite it looking simple yet complex at the same time due to the collision and blending of the “housewife” photographs and look at the darker sinister yet troubled feeling behind the final outcome with the black and white. I decided to use both the masculine (focus on skin and body) and focus on the traditional female housewife in 1950-60s in the kitchen and how that plays a part with the subject looking upset, innocent and fragile.

• My intention with this photograph above was looking at Cindy Sherman’s photographs including her vulnerability and angles that she used in her photographs and her “untitled still life” work and adapted it into my work and the way I decide to position my camera.

• In these photographs I decided to focus on the different lighting techniques such as split lighting, butterfly/loop, rembrandt. I looked at my headshots and other studio photographs and chose my best one and the ones a think look the brightest and most creative and yet simple. I included my remembrandt bright photograph that I think looks sweet and minimalistic, that it emphasis even more the apples in her cheeks. In the centre photograph I included one of my edits of the “disguise-like ” covered hands photoshop editing. I believe it looks creative and interesting like a hand in motion type of story, how the hands looked being covered over the eyes vs how they look moved away from the face.
• In the third photograph I included the subject with half the face being covered with the light (split lighting). I think it looks sinister and appealing to the audience as the subject appears to be smiling at the lens so it gives it a more uncomforting sense to the image.

• In these environmental portraits I included two female works both in selling items to consumers but different environments. I realised my intentions with the photographs and photoshoot, I intended to make the workers the main and centre body of the image as they made it a whole as without the subject the background body of the photograph would only be an “environment” not “environmental portrait”. I wanted the photographs to look positive and not complex to understand for the audience so therefore the mugs in the first picture especially with the colourful background meant that the audience knew that the “environmental portrait” made sense with “pottery” and the element of painting and creativity in that specific place of work. Whereas the lady subject on the right had being selling knitting and different types of yarn ,I positioned the individual with the item therefore being able to deliver the message and understanding to the audience.

• For my presentation of final outcomes I decided to put my edited images of masculine & feminine portraits, a couple of the different lighting techniques I experimented with and some of my environmental portraits in a “virtual gallery”.
• For the first virtual gallery I chose to present my virtual gallery with my four monochrome Cindy Sherman inspired photographs. I chose to put a slight black border around the image and a very slight drop shadow to present the effect as a “shadow” of the photograph “border”.

• In this photoshoot, I focused on producing photographs inspired by the ideas and features of stereotypical and general make/masculine bodies and outlooks. Whether that is a pose or body art I decided to include it in my work. I took photographs highlighting the muscular parts of a male body and or experimented/played around with poses the male subject felt comfortable with (UFC Face-Offs).
• One aspect that I would have changed in my opinion would have been the lighting in the photographs as many of the photographs have a black/generally dark background so therefore I would change that so that the editing of the photographs would be easier to modify like the levels as the photographs are already dark enough. Creating a brighter/lighter atmosphere would ensure that the photographs are easier to edit and therefore look better/ more presentable, the subject looks more focused and important.

• In these specific photographs, I decided to focus on the subject’s defined features like muscle and especially flexing something that can be specifically connected with masculinity and the themes of power, strength, and force. For all three of these photographs presented above I edited and modeled in black and white for the centered body part to be even more defined and structured as I believe these tones paired well together in the monochromatic style.

• In these photographs, I presented a less formal approach and decided to play around with the position of my subjects in the photographs, and considering both the subjects are male I s]wanted them to feel what they felt most comfortable doing.
• Overall I wanted both subjects side by side representing the difference in head and structure, for example, if the male subject has broader shoulders or not (something that can be described/thought of as more of a masculine feature)

• In these two photographs, the image is taken from a closer perspective of the subject. The features of a masculine-like body can be presented again as Adam’s apple is presented as well. This particular feature is more prominent in male bodies and the “thyroid cartilage”. Therefore the recognisable Adams apple can be recognized as a more male-like attribute and something to bring attention to.

• In this photograph the subjects are presented opposing each other, as mentioned before at the beginning the subjects are in a similar position as a UFC face-off. Despite the positioning not being formal, I believe this positioning can represent this childlike boyhood playfulness and immaturity coming from two teenage boy subjects with bright and cheerful facial expressions.

• In these three photographs presented, I wanted to include and compose basic close-up portraits of the male subject. I wanted the photographs to focus solely on the subject and to look formal and somewhat strong through the stare in the camera, through the side profile emphasizing a masculine jawline, and once again Adam’s apple making an appearance. In the last photograph from the right the subject appears to look smiley and breaks the contrast from an intense glare/ confident approach towards the photograph, though the subject doesn’t have the stereotypical and sturdy look of a masculine-like individual, the photograph still presents an open display of emotions (something that may have been demonstrated less in photography a couple of decades ago).