Photographs of the Southwest
By Ansel Adams
New York Photographic Society, 1976
Comments: One of the photography courses I took in college was about how to use something called the zone system. It was essentially a method of pre-visualizing the dynamic range desired for an image and then adjusting the exposure/development/printing variables to achieve the proper result. In practice the process was quite analytical and required a fair amount of discipline to achieve predictable outcomes, particularly in the era of film. It was this line of study that first introduced me to the work of Ansel Adams, one of the most renowned practitioners of the technique. Adams achieved an extraordinary degree of artistry in his work and I've been an admirer and collector since I first discovered him. I have several of his books, including both image collections and instructional titles, with this one being the most recent addition to my library.
The book is a collection of 109 images taken by Adams during a wide span of his career, from 1928 to 1968, all thematically bound by having source locations in the U.S. Southwest. It features a variety of landscapes, architecture, and portraits of native people from the region, including a few of the most iconic images for which Adams is known, such as Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico, 1941, and White House ruin, Canyon de Chelly National Monument, Arizona, c. 1942. The reproductions are all rich, multi-tonal black and white images, each carefully manipulated to perfection in the classic Adams style. There is also a companion essay by Lawrence Clark Powell, but the photographs are clearly the prime subject. This published collection is certainly the equal of any other from Adams extensive body of work, and well worth a place on the bookshelf for anyone interested in great photography.
Copy Notes: Hardback, first printing
By Ansel Adams
New York Photographic Society, 1976
Comments: One of the photography courses I took in college was about how to use something called the zone system. It was essentially a method of pre-visualizing the dynamic range desired for an image and then adjusting the exposure/development/printing variables to achieve the proper result. In practice the process was quite analytical and required a fair amount of discipline to achieve predictable outcomes, particularly in the era of film. It was this line of study that first introduced me to the work of Ansel Adams, one of the most renowned practitioners of the technique. Adams achieved an extraordinary degree of artistry in his work and I've been an admirer and collector since I first discovered him. I have several of his books, including both image collections and instructional titles, with this one being the most recent addition to my library.
The book is a collection of 109 images taken by Adams during a wide span of his career, from 1928 to 1968, all thematically bound by having source locations in the U.S. Southwest. It features a variety of landscapes, architecture, and portraits of native people from the region, including a few of the most iconic images for which Adams is known, such as Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico, 1941, and White House ruin, Canyon de Chelly National Monument, Arizona, c. 1942. The reproductions are all rich, multi-tonal black and white images, each carefully manipulated to perfection in the classic Adams style. There is also a companion essay by Lawrence Clark Powell, but the photographs are clearly the prime subject. This published collection is certainly the equal of any other from Adams extensive body of work, and well worth a place on the bookshelf for anyone interested in great photography.
Copy Notes: Hardback, first printing
