Estimated Price:

   £   

Realised Price:

   £   

What is this symbol? This symbol indicates that this auction hose has verified this price result.

Login or subscribe to view price data

mounted, signed by the photographer in pencil on the mount, his letterpress 'San Francisco' studio label with typed title and date on the reverse, matted, 1938

LITERATURE AND REFERENCES

Ansel Adams (Morgan & Morgan, 1972), pl. 71

Ansel Adams: Yosemite and the Range of Light (Boston, 1979), cover

Watkins to Weston: 101 Years of California Photography, 1849-1950 (Santa Barbara Museum of Art, 1992), p. 128

Ansel Adams, Examples: The Making of 40 Photographs (Boston, 1983), p. 102

Ansel Adams and Mary Street Alinder, Ansel Adams: An Autobiography (Boston, 1985), p. 243

James Alinder and John Szarkowski, Ansel Adams: Classic Images (Boston, 1985), pl. 46

Mary Street Alinder and Andrea Gray Stillman, Ansel Adams: Letters and Images 1916-1984 (Boston, 1988), p. 369

Robert Doty, Photography in America, (New York, 1974), pp. 128-29

Andrea Gray Stillman, Editor, Yosemite: Ansel Adams (Boston, 1995), pl. 1

John Szarkowski, Ansel Adams at 100 (Boston, 2001), p. 89

John Szarkowski, The Portfolios of Ansel Adams (Boston, 1977), p. 49
CATALOGUE NOTE

The typed date of 1938 that appears on this vintage print's studio label is earlier than any date previously assigned to this negative. Customarily known in the Adams literature as 'Clearing Winter Storm,' this image has traditionally been dated to circa 1944. In Ansel Adams at 100, John Szarkowski hints at his belief that this image might have been made prior to 1944 when he dates the photograph '1942 or earlier.'

Beginning in the 1930s, Adams made a number of photographs from Inspiration Point in Yosemite Valley, and the image offered here is the most iconic from the series. Adams wrote of this image, 'I have been at this location countless times over many years, but only once did I encounter just such a combination of visual elements' (Examples, p. 106). Taken on a day in early December, Adams arrived at Inspiration Point just as a storm, which had started as rain and had turned to snow, began to clear. Working deftly and quickly with this cumbersome 8 by 10-inch camera, Adams was able to capture the fleeting retreat of the clouds on film.