Photographer of the Week: Ansel Adams

Ansel Adams was one of the best known photographers of the early 20th century, as well as one of the best known advocates for environmental conservation. Throughout his life, he had a deep love of nature, and an abiding passion for photography as a medium, which was reflected in his work throughout his life. 

Born in 1902, Ansel Adams read the works of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau in his youth. Reading their works gave him his long-standing love of the wilderness, which was one of many factors that led him to become such a strong advocate of environmental issues. The transcendentalist views discussed in their writings had a strong influence on his later photographic work. 

Adams first visited Yosemite National Park in 1915, and visited the area countless times throughout his life. He joined the Sierra Club, an organization of photographers and environmentalists dedicated to conservation efforts in the Sierra Nevada range, in 1916. Later, he joined their board of directors in 1934. In later life, he received the Conservation Service Award in 1968, and the Medal of Freedom in 1980, both for his conservation efforts.

One of the many things Ansel Adams was known for was his "visualization" method for taking photos. Before he even took the photo, he would carefully envision what he wanted its final composition to look like. He then created what he'd visualized using various lenses, filters, and editing techniques. Chief among these editing techniques was the "Zone System," a process which calculated the exposure & development of film to very precise shades of grey. Each part of a frame was separated into zones, and each one was assigned a number between 0 (pure white) and 9 (pure black). The end result was a photo that showed details in highly sharp clarity.  In using these methods, Adams sought to not simply capture what he saw when he took a photograph, but to convey how what he saw made him feel.

Like many renowned artists, Ansel Adams often struggled to make ends meet. Despite this, his work still proved to be immensely popular throughout his life, being shown in many publications and galleries. His first "big break" was having some of his photographs published in the Sierra Club's newsletter. Years later, he opened his own creative photography center in his home town of San Francisco, and founded the California School of Fine Arts' Department of Photography. 

Despite his fame, Adams did still struggle financially from month to month. To balance this out, he often took several commercial photography jobs. Naturally these jobs often entailed taking photos for the National Park Service, which used them to encourage tourism, but also included work for many notable publications like Life, Fortune, and Arizona Highways magazines. Adams disliked his commercial work only because it often took time away from his artistic pursuits. Aside from that, he didn't have much of a problem with doing it. He saw it as a necessity to get by, and looked down on the idea of photographers who saw commercial work as "selling out."

One bit of commercial work Adams never had any problems with doing was his prolific work for Polaroid, indisputably his favorite camera manufacturers. From 1948 until his death in 1984, he worked for them as a consultant. In that capacity, he tested all of their new cameras that they put out in that time, as well as any new  types of film. He also helped train many of their staff photographers.

Ansel Adams had a somewhat unique approach to the issue of environmental conservation. Instead of taking photographs specifically meant to argue the point of protecting the wilderness, he preferred to show people the ones he had taken of the unspoiled beauty of nature, and let those be enough to inspire people. 

Even though he was perfectly fine with the National Park Service using his photos to advertise tourism to the Yosemite area, Adams grew increasingly concerned about the effects increased tourism would have on the park in the future. A concern that is still relevant today. 

In 1935, the Sierra Club asked Adams to go to Congress and argue in favor of a bill to create the Kings River National Park. He used many of his own photographs to literally illustrate the points he was making to the members of the committee discussing the matter. When the bill to create the park was reintroduced in 1937, Adams mailed a copy of his new book, "The Sierra Nevadas and the John Muir Trail," to the director of the National Park Service. The director later showed the book to President Franlin Delano Roosevelt, himself a staunch environmentalist.

In a rare divergence from his regular work, Ansel Adams decided to collaborate with Dorothea Lange to document the Japanese Americans who had been relocated to internment camps during World War 2. In his own words, Adams considered their relocation a "forced exodus." Being inexperienced with journalistic photography, Adams instead took a similar approach as with his landscape photography. He took shots that showed the internees going about their daily lives, and ones that showed them in an idealized light (literally), both meant to convey the idea that despite the injustices they had suffered, they had held onto their dignity and had managed to make the most out of their situation. 

However, the reception of his work was mixed. Some members of the general populace saw his work as "subversive" and "unamerican." Some even went so far as to organize burnings of the book he later published on the subject. Critics, meanwhile, had more rational and balanced things to say about his work. Some felt that his photos lacked depth, seemed too stylized to feel realistic, and failed to properly convey the plight of those detained. 

Ansel Adams was an advocate of "straight photography," which means authentically taking and presenting photos "as is," without any alterations made to change the photograph's meaning. His work used light and dark shading to draw the viewer’s eye to certain details in a picture. Reflecting his past career in music, he would often make analogies between it and photography; in these, the film negative was the score, and a print made from it was the performance. Adams was fascinated by the potential new technologies represented. Taking the music analogy a step further, he considered making new prints of his work with these new technologies to be like a modern reimagining of a classical piece. A very apropos analogy, considering modern digital enhancement techniques.

When Ansel Adams died in 1984, he was honored with a 100,000-acre wilderness preserve in Yosemite that was named after him, as well as an 11,000 foot peak in Yosemite a year later.

GALLERY 

“Mt. McKinley, Wonder Lake,” 1947

"Monolith, the Face at Half Dome," 1927

"Ruins of Old Church," c. 1929

SOURCES

"Master of Light" by Therese Lichtenstein, publised 1997 by Todtri Productions LTD.

https://slate.com/culture/2015/09/ansel-adams-photographs-manzanar-war-relocation-center-in-the-exhibition-manzanar-the-wartime-photographs-of-ansel-adams-at-the-skirball-cultural-center.html

Japanese camp pics and information

http://anseladams.com/the-artists-of-manzanar/

Additional Japanese camp info

All other photos copied from the gallery at http://anseladams.com 

http://anseladams.com/ansel-adams-bio/

Additional biographical information

Free Shot Week: Pyburn and Daughter Gallery

Anne Margratten (right) greets Barbara and Gail Pyburn (bottom and top left, respectively) before the reception for their art gallery, "Pyburn and Daughter" in the North Santiam Hall, on Wednesday Nov. 6th, 2019

James-Harley Barr, pictured left, originally conceived of the gallery as a way of shedding light on the works of local female artists. Anne Margratten, visual arts instructor and gallery coordinator, helped him with organizing it. Wednesday, Nov. 6th 2019.

During the reception, Barbara and Gail Pyburn talked about a myriad of topics. Gail talked about how she got into photography, the history behind some of her more notable works, and how she began the work of compiling her gallery. Her mother Barbara talked about her sources of inspiration as a painter, as well as which among her works displayed in the North Santiam Hall was her personal favorite. Wednesday, Nov. 6th 2019.

My Hometown

A store location closing then reopening under a different name/company is nothing new in this "rapidly changing" economy. However, this building on the corner of Main and Airport in Lebanon stands out because it's easily changed hands more than any other commercial building in town. At least half a dozen times in the decade+ years I've lived in Lebanon, this location has been changed to a different name while the interior of the store remained the largely the same. For the longest time it just seemed like it was the same grocery store each time it "closed," to the point that I and many others would just keep calling it by its previous name for months after the change. However, the most recent time it's closed and reopened, it was changed to a furniture store, as seen above.

One of the most successful businesses in Lebanon's downtown area is thrift stores selling second-hand items. Here, an elderly couple loads some recently purchased furniture into a trailer bed hitched to their truck. 

Kristen Craven, pictured above, works as a receptionist at MBVA, a co-op set up in a recently renovated office building in downtown Lebanon. The co-op contains a wide variety of businesses ranging from a coffee shop to a hypnotherapy clinic.

Action Shots Assignment

CLOSE UP:

A member of LBCC's baseball team runs laps around the campus'
baseball diamond during the team's afternoon practice

GROUP SHOT:

The LBCC baseball team runs a backwards lap around the
campus baseball diamond while warming up before practice.

MEDIUM SHOT:

Members of the LBCC baseball team practice
pitching and catching in the outfield

Forum Post - Week 5: Lynsay Addario Response

My impressions of the book is still more or less the same as when I read the prologue and first chapter. I still appreciate how Lynsey Addario’s writing manages to convey what it's like being in the regions she’s worked in. I also feel that in a broad sense, her journey through life as a photojournalist provides a lot of insight as to the do’s and don’t of breaking into the field. One practical lesson in particular stands out in hindsight: At first, I was confused as to why she kept talking about carrying several cameras at once. It just seemed impractical to me at the time. But, several of my recent photo projects have called for switching between different lenses as quickly as possible, and eventually I realized that being able to just switch to a second camera with a different lens would probably save a lot of time.

One other thing I’ve admired was her efforts to humanize the people living in Pakistan and Afghanistan. I agreed wholeheartedly with her desire to try and dispel the stereotyping common to news media. That part of the book did also give me a slight point of contention, however. On page 72, she wrote, “In Pakistan I learned quickly to tuck away my own political beliefs while I worked and to act as a messenger and conduit of ideas for the people I photographed.” Now, while I do understand where she’s coming from there, and I do agree to a point, that line was only a few paragraphs after the part where she wrote about Pakistani women openly praising the 9/11 attacks. I believe my reaction was, “Basic human decency is not a political belief.” That whole part of the book left me questioning my ability to be objective as a journalist; Innocent people getting hurt because of someone’s personal beliefs is kind of a big moral hot button for me; Hearing someone PRAISE said innocent people being killed, doubly so.

Another reason why I don’t think I’m cut out for the kind of journalism she works is the toll it took on her social life. I always thought being a journalist would be a great chance to see the world, learn about other people and cultures, and all that. Did not stop and consider the difficulty it would cause when it comes to maintaining relationships with people. Though, I’ve never had a particularly robust social life. Not to mention that staying in touch with people is a lot easier nowadays thanks to Facebook and Skype. Still, her difficulties with personal intimacy DO seem like something to keep in mind. I’ll be looking out for any ways she figures out to find a balance with her work and personal lives later in the book.

Looking over the photos provided in the book, I think that they were as effective as Addario’s writing at conveying what it was like being at the time and place each was taken. Shots of refugees, of women going about their daily lives, people celebrating; each one conveyed its intended point without feeling fake or artificial. I think the one that left the biggest impact with me would be the shot of a man leaning against a wall while looking over bodies exhumed from a mass grave. The shot subtly conveys his emotional reaction without even needing to show his face. Like most of her pictures, I can immediately tell what’s going on in it without needing a caption.

Forum Post - Week 6: Action Photos Topic

For this assignment, I'm going to go out to the field where the sports teams practice. If I go in the afternoon I should have a good chance of finding a group of people to take pictures of. An alternative option would be the dance club. They meet on Thursdays, and it seems like they'd be a good opportunity to try something different.

The main difficulty I anticipate having would be variety. Since it's just going to be members of our local team practicing with each other, it's going to be pictures of the same people doing the same general activities. This should be offset by taking shots from different angles and locations, though there are only so many places one can go without getting in the team's way. Which leads me to the other difficulty: proximity. The long lens should work to get good pictures of people from a, let's go with "discrete" distance, but if you want to take a wider shot that would require the smaller lens you could likely miss your photo opportunity in the time it takes to switch them.

Forum Post - Week 7: Photo Story Ideas

My first idea for the photo story assignment is to take pictures of the construction work being done around the LBCC campus. The current plan is to take pictures of each work area every day from monday to friday, and trying to get said pictures from the same angle each time. Then, I'll take the pictures of each site and set them up in sequential order with appropriate captions.

My second idea is to go to a restaurant somewhere and do something to convey the idea of an entire day passing. The current method of doing so would be to do a series of time-lapse photos at various times of the day. Morning, afternoon, evening, etc. I'd probably want to do it at a fast-food restaurant, because the smaller eating area should make getting shots of the whole area easier.

Forum Post - Week 7: My Hometown

The subject I'm planning on doing is my good ol' hometown of Lebanon. I don't exaggerate when I say I know EVERY good place within the city limits that'd make for a good photo. Not only that, but I also know what angles and areas are good to take photos FROM. For an event, I have several ideas: The most obvious one would be the farmer's market on Thursday, though since that's literally the day before the due date I think I should definitely shoot an event earlier in the week just in case. On that note I figure I can either do the High School football game's practices or even maybe an actual game. If one's willing to stretch the definition of an "event," I was thinking of some sort of mosaic shot of a park, where I take shots from the same place and angle at different times, then superimpose all the shots together.

Landmarks're easy, and I've got two ideas off the top of my head. The Kuhn theater is our local cinema, and there's a lot I can say about AND some of its more recent history. Right across the street from it is a plaza, which was recently built over an empty lot that had 3 large, beautiful murals on the outside walls of the adjacent buildings. I think this is the more interesting topic, because it's a newer landmark that was built in place of an old one. I can discuss both at length, and I even have some photos of the old murals sitting in an old folder or flash drive somewhere.

I don't have a lot of ideas for a portrait shot. The easy solution would be to shoot someone at the farmer's market, or one of the other events I might end up doing. I also thought I might get ambitious and see if I can get in touch with anyone at city hall. Barring that, figured I'd just do a shot of someone that works at one of the shops downtown.

Environmental Portrait Assignment

Josh Green is a Culinary Arts instructor at Albany LBCC. He started off as a dishwasher before going on to study culinary arts in Portland. He decided to become a teacher so he could pass along the ideals he learned there, like sustainability, creating relationships with local farmers and artisans, and sourcing local ingredients.

"My favorite thing to cook is anything new. I like to try recipes that I have never done before and don't have the most experience with. That way I continue to learn and broaden my palate."